Deep Water Test

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The secret to making lasting changes.

Mystical Autumn Leaves

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

As the trees shed their leaves, I search for a kabbalistic understanding: Why did God create a world where I need to do all this raking?

Debt Ceiling and Tisha B’Av

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Raising our personal debt ceiling for tolerance and peace will bring down the spiritual debt of our nation.

Will We Remember Leiby in a Month?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

How to make a permanent change for Leiby's memory.

Turning 40

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

For my 40th birthday, I decided to dream again.

Facing the Music

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

A year after my mother's death, I couldn't bring myself to listen to music again.

Dealing with Death

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Death ends a life, not a relationship.

LeBronathon

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

How to hype up your life.

Correcting Our Vision

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Why did God create so many of us with faulty vision?

Losing Weight this Passover

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Passover's solution to why diets don't work.

Becoming a Holy Drunk

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

It seems a bit funny, but getting drunk on Purim can be a spiritual experience.

Losing Weight this Passover

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Passover's solution to why diets don't work.

Surviving a Spiritual Recession

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

How to get through life's ups and downs.

Time for Change

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The American elections and Rosh Hashana.

Why Clouds?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Mystical lessons within the clouds.

Applying "The Last Lecture"

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

If you had one last lecture to give before you died, what would it be?

Shabbos and Competition

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

We should only be competitive with ourselves.

Torch Protests

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The Jewish people have their own ancient torch ceremony.

Turn On the Lights

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Why do we signify Shabbat's entry by lighting up the lights?

Why Do We Smile?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Share yourself and your wisdom with the world. Smile.

The $700 per Pound Mushroom

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

If a mushroom can cost $700 a pound, how much are you worth?

The Weekly Wedding

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

What does it mean that Shabbat is married to the Jewish people?

The World Series of Life

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

In life no one's a benchwarmer, and other key lessons from baseball.

The Wonder of Thunder

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

What's the deeper meaning behind the creation of a loud smack right in the middle of a heavy rainstorm?

Mother's Day, Jewish Style

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Go ahead and take her out for dinner, but make sure your display of gratitude isn't just a once-a-year occasion.

Sefira Beards and Beacons_

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Rabbi Yaakov Weinberg's insights on the mourning period for Rebbe Akiva's students.

Torah with Morrie, Final: Leaving a Legacy

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Death ends a life, not a relationship.

Torah with Morrie #19: The Completion of Life

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

It isn't the physical life itself that makes the difference; it is the legacy.

Torah with Morrie #18: Avoiding Youth Envy

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Appreciating the gifts that old age provides.

Torah with Morrie #17: Embracing the Aging Process

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Respecting elders is more than good manners, it shows what is truly important in life.

Torah with Morrie #16: Being Number Two

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The pitfalls of trying to always be Number One.

Torah with Morrie #15: Parenting with Pride

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Why did God create the world where grownups must suffer through inattentiveness, non-compliance, and general moodiness with our kids?

Torah with Morrie #14: Family First

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

What is the most important element in achieving happiness?

Torah with Morrie #13: Giving Through Taking

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Sometimes the best way to give is by allowing others give to us and take.

Torah with Morrie #12: Making Meaningful Moments...

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

How can we ever truly enjoy something when we know that all things will pass?

Torah with Morrie 11: Learn How to Die; Learn How...

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Are you ready to die today?

Torah with Morrie #10: Finding One True Friend

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Everyone needs that one person who understands us and with whom we can communicate openly without any pretenses.

God At The Crossroads Of Our Lives

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Jerry and his wife, Karen, were facing a crisis. They had moved to Wheeling, West Virginia from the suburbs of Chicago just 2 years before, due to a ...

Torah with Morrie #9: Timeless Teachers

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Parents give physical life to a child; teachers inject that life with purpose and meaning.

Torah with Morrie #8: Criticism on the Rebound

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The faults we accuse others of can most often be found within ourselves.

Torah with Morrie #7: Limiting Self-Pity

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Living with joy despite our setbacks and travails.

Torah with Morrie #6: Feeling for Others

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Striving to live with an awareness of the pain of others and do what we can to alleviate their burden.

Torah with Morrie #5: Other People's Dramas

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

You don't need to be famous to be a hero.

Torah With Morrie #4: Live Like You're Dying

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Living life urgently, intensely and purposefully.

Torah with Morrie #3: Living Funerals

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Why wait for a funeral to give heartfelt praise about those you love?

Torah with Morrie #2: Living with Youthful Passion

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Whether you're over the hill or not depends on whether you still feel like climbing.

Torah with Morrie: The Value of Silence

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

What comfort do we find in all the noise?

Life in the Swing State

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Spiritual lessons from the crucial presidential vote in Ohio.

Downfall of the Yankees

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Does God care about the baseball playoffs?

Lessons from the 9/11/ Commission Report

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Overcoming our failure of imagination.

The Murder of Nick Berg

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Trying to make sense of the savagery.

Of 'Sefira' Beards and Beacons Gone Bad

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

If you take a look at Jewish men post-Passover, you'll probably notice many of them with stubble on their faces, the beginnings of beards. Why the ...

Sefira Beards and Beacons

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Rabbi Yaakov Weinberg's insights on the mourning period for Rebbe Akiva's students.

Facing Death Properly

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Death. We never truly wish to face the fact that one day we will eventually die. Yet, we ignore it at our own peril. We must live our lives in ways ...

Shmini Atzeret: Simcha Without the Sukkah?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

We have a difficult problem to address. Sukkot is called "Zman Simchateinu," the Season of our Joy, in the Festival Shemoneh Esrai prayers. This is ...

Is Competition Healthy?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Sadly, Moshe prepares to leave the stage in this week's Parsha, Vayelech. He declares that he will not be leading the Jewish people into the Land of ...

Capital Punishment and Curbing Crime

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

You would get the impression from a few verses in Parshas Masay that the Torah takes the crime of homicide very seriously. No less than 29 verses ...

Is the Torah Anti-Semitic?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The authorship of the Torah has one of two possibilities: either God wrote it, or a human being wrote it. Let's take for argument's sake the side ...

Do Animals Have Rights?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

"We condemn totally the infliction of suffering upon our brother animals, and the curtailment of their enjoyment, unless it be necessary for their ...

Parenting Advice

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

We all try to be perfect parents. We all know how difficult it is to be a perfect parent. And eventually we realize that we can never be perfect ...

The Sabbatical year and the Divine authorship of...

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

It is wrong to live by rote. Living as mechanical robots contradicts spiritual growth. We need to know why we are Jewish and why we believe what we ...

Following the Rabbi's Lead

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

In Israel, religious political parties generally consult spiritual leaders on a wide range of issues. To a modern person, it seems odd that ...

Forestalling the Stage of Acceptance

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

It would be tragic to accept the crisis in Israel as a normal part of reality.

God's Love for Us

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Have you ever felt uninspired in your Judaism? Did you ever wonder if there was some kind of special weapon that can be used against despair and ...

Parenting Prophets

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Every so often something happens with one of my kids and I begin to understand what parenting is all about. This is one of those moments.

The Pursuit of Happiness

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Yes, we all are entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Life and liberty come easily, but it seems that while we indeed pursue ...

Status as a Symbol

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The topics of repentance and Yom Kippur need not be all fire and brimstone. There is much about repentance that is positive, inspiring, and ...

A Personal God

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Elul. The very mention of this repentance-filled, preparatory month before Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, usually evokes feelings of dread. ...

Cells of One Organism

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Joey was having a rough time. His fourteen-year-old mind was beginning to challenge much of what he had always taken for granted. He didn't ...

Loud Libraries

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Libraries are usually quiet places to allow for contemplation and concentration. Yet, if you walk into a Torah study hall, you may be surprised at ...

Children and Sacrifices

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

No, we will not be discussing child sacrifice, but rather, the sacrifices parents make for their children. If we had to link two commandments in ...

Exile and Its Egregious Effects

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

We may not notice it as much as previous generations did due to the relative good relations with the non-Jewish world (though recent events have ...

If Dogs Could Talk

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Would you rather be blind or deaf? God forbid it should ever happen, but let's say you had to make a choice between having your sense of sight be ...

Appreciating the Process

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

"First, I was dying to finish high school. Then, I was dying to finish college. After that, I was dying to get married. Then, I was dying to have ...

Remembering Sinai

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

"Rabbi, do you really think the Torah is to be taken literally? Isn't it just a nice book of legends?" "And do you really believe the story of ...

The Shema, Our Emotions, and Our Commandments

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Rabbi Yaakov Weinberg, of blessed memory, was once walking in the corridor toward the Main Study Hall (Beit Midrash) of the Ner Israel Rabbinical ...

It's Not Really the Thought That Counts

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

For the past several years, our brethren in Israel have faced terrorism of the most horrendous kind. Dozens of suicide bombings, numerous sniper ...

Give War a Chance

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

"War is a crime against humanity." "There is no such thing as a justified war." These are statements from pacifists. "Pacifism: Opposition to the ...

Success That Hurts

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The headlines shock us. It seems like every few weeks the newspapers report more and more crime scandals involving famous athletes or Hollywood ...

Killing With Love

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

We know that sometimes people ignore the message and kill the messenger. Judaism actually teaches that we must ignore the messenger and apply (or ...

Learning how to lead

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

The first Rashi in Parshat Be'Ha'alotcha raises a puzzling question. (Loose translation): "Why was the section of the Menorah placed near the ...

Permission to Protect

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Have you ever met permissive parents -- the ones that worship the concept of "openness" so much that they don't mind exposing their kids to just ...

Shavuot: The 'Weekest' Link

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

For the weekly Torah portion in Israel, please click here: http://www.aish.com/torahportion/kolyaakov/Permission_to_Protect.asp Passover has its ...

The Rewards of Having a Rabbi

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

John and David were researching a Talmudic passage. "Come on, Dave", John urged. "The paper's due tomorrow and it's already 10:00 PM. Let's just ...

It's a meaningful life

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

There's an old expression, "Time is Money." We all know as well that life is the sum total of all of our moments in time. Hence, "Time is Life." ...

Are All Men Created Equal?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

At Mount Sinai, God described the Jewish People as a holy nation (Shemot 19:6). But it sounds too difficult and lofty a concept for us to handle. ...

Uncomfortable Musings for Comfortable Jews

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Something is strange. The arrangement throughout the Parshas of Tzaria-Metzora is unusual. These Parshas describe the laws of tzaarat, a ...

Sacrifices and the 'Value' of Idol Worship

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

It sounds funny doesn't it. Can there really be something valuable in worshipping idols? Isn't idol worship Public Enemy #1 in the eyes of the ...

Let's Not Let Passover Pass Over

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Let's not let Passover pass over

L'Chaim - To Life?

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Life is good. There is no doubt that the vast majority of us feel this way. This is why the most common Jewish drink toast is "L'Chaim," To Life. ...

A Temple Full of Blood

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Dedicated Lezecher Nishmas Yechiel Michael ben Aryeh and Eka Miriam bas Menachem Simcha by Mr. and Mrs. Jack Fried of Cincinnati For many weeks ...

The Power of Community

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

Here we go again. We seem to being having deja vu. Wasn't it just a few short weeks ago that we read the Torah's account of the construction of the ...

Miracles don't really matter

by Rabbi Boruch Leff

We've all said it ourselves or we have at least heard someone else say it: "If only God would appear and show me some miracle, then I would truly ...

Judgment Means Love

by Rabbi Boruch Leff