14 Aug SPEAK YOUR VUES WITH THE VUES MASTER

TISHA B’AV
Dear Vues Master:
The following is an inspirational letter that Rabbi
Heber sent his talmidim to help them have a proper
perspective this past Tisha B’av. Rabbi Moshe Dov
Heber is a Middle School Rebbi in Yeshiva K’tana
of Waterbury, the Director of the Mishmar Evening
Program in Waterbury and Division Head in Camp
Romimu. Dear Talmidim, We have all experienced
Tisha B’av in the past. It was a day where we heard
that we were supposed to feel sad. We sat on the floor.
We saw how serious our parents were. But honestly
it may have not meant so much for us. Life seemed
fine and there was not much to mourn since we
sometimes have a hard time connecting with things
of the past. Ask anyone who lived through hard times
to explain to you what it means to mourn and be sad.
Ask anyone who survived the Holocaust and they
could give you a glimpse into what Tisha B’av means.
Over the last 10 months we have all heard the news.
October Seventh. Hostages. Soldiers. Anti-semitism.
Attacks. Rockets. Protests. Words that we may have
not heard in the past, now headline the news and our
lives. We may even know people directly affected by
the ongoing “news”. Even if we don’t, we – as part of
Klal Yisrael – know that we are all affected deeply. We
have all said Tehillim, and davened. Many of us have
taken on something special as a zechus for our dear
brothers and sisters, but we could still do more. We are
approaching the saddest day of the year, Tisha B’av,
the root of everything tragic and sad that Klal Yisroel
has gone through. This year we may be able to feel real
pain. We can perhaps now understand what it means
to suffer and mourn. Let us use this as an opportunity
for growth and connection. It could be our most
meaningful Tisha B’av yet. As you sit on the floor and
hear about the history of the Jewish people, close your
eyes for five seconds. Imagine what it was when the
Bais Hamikdash was destroyed. Close your eyes and
imagine what it was to be beaten by the Nazis during
the Holocaust. Close your eyes and imagine what our

brothers and sisters are going through TODAY! The
hope is that through that you will be able to connect
to Tisha B’av in a real way. When you open your eyes
hopefully you will see Klal Yisroel heralding in good
times, as we all make our way to Eretz Yisroel with the
coming of Moshiach.
Be’ahava, Rebbe
Vues Master’s Note: Amazing!

THE WEST PARK WALK
Dear Vues Master: Just curious. Is it a halacha for
everyone that goes to West Park colony to take a walk
with their spouse on Friday morning? I always drive
from Woodbourne to Woodridge on Friday morning
and see the entire West Park walking with their
spouses. I think it’s great!
RT
Vues Master’s Note: Definitely not a Halacha!

MUSIC
Dear Vues Master:
I had an experience that happened to me at a milchig
restaurant over the Nine days that I wanted to share
with your readers. I went out with a few friends for
dinner one night last week. In the middle of our
meal the waiters come out blasting music & singing
Happy Birthday to a person at the table next to us. I
was honestly shocked that they would do such a thing
during the Nine Days. It’s not like me, but I decided to
say something to the mashgiach. He understood what
I was saying, but said that the hashgacha was ok with
it. I asked him to ask the hashgacha again. About a half
hour later the waiters came out with another birthday
cake but this time they used acapella music. I’m glad I
opened my mouth. During the Nine Days people forget
that we are in a time of aveilus.
RH
Vues Master’s Note: I am not so sure Acapella is better.
As it is music that might make you want to dance and
clap your hands!

MAZEL TOV COUNTRY VUES
Dear Vues Master
Just wanted to wish the entire staff at
The Country Vues a big mazel tov on
your 41st Anniversary. Our entire family
looks forward to the Country Vues
every week throughout the summer
& we really enjoy your columnists,
advertisements, fun questions & jokes.
Keep up the great work!
YJ
Vues Master’s Note: Thank YOU!!! We
appreciate our readers & advertisers
very much!

HESPED
Dear Vues Master: One morning in 1948,
during Rav Chatzkel Levenstein’s tenure
as mashgiach at the Mirrer Yeshiva in
Brooklyn, he walked into the yeshiva
and noticed a group of boys huddled in a
corner immersed in a discussion. When
he inquired what the tumult was all
about, he was informed by an American
bochur, “Didn’t the mashgiach hear?
Babe Ruth the famous baseball shpieler
died!” That evening after Maariv, Rav
Chatzkel addressed the yeshivah: “I
asked someone what the eulogizers said
about the groise baseball shpieler at his
levayah. Do you want to know what
they said? They said that since he grew
up in an orphanage, he spent his life
going out of his way to help orphans.”
Rav Chatzkel then raised the tone of his
voice “Do you realize that his ‘gadlus’
in this world was that he was a great
baseball shpieler, but at the levayah
they talked about how he took care of
orphans? Afilu a goy farshteit that after
120, in the other world, baseball doesn’t
count. Life is all about what you do for
other people!”
Country Yossi Toiv
Vues Master’s Note: What a lesson!

TEACH HATE
Dear Vues Master:
A new study has found that the
curriculum used in the Palestinian
Authority’s schools are still filled with
anti-Jewish and anti-Israel hatred. How
will that affect the chances for Middle

East peace? One of the most significant
provisions of the Oslo Accords, which
Israel and the PA signed three decades
ago, was that the Palestinian Arabs
would stop teaching hate to their
children. According to the Oslo II
agreement (Article XXII [1]), the PA is
obligated to “abstain from incitement,
including hostile propaganda.” The most
important place to begin implementing
that new policy was the PA’s schools.
The only hope for a genuine and durable
peace in the region is if Palestinian Arab
boys and girls are raised to embrace
peace and coexistence, and reject hatred
and violence. Yet in the years following
the signing of those accords, multiple
studies by groups such as Palestinian

Media Watch, MEMRI, and Impact-
SE found that the PA was continuing to

teach children to hate and kill Jews. The
U.S. State Department and J Street kept
telling us that the Palestinian Authority
was changing, becoming moderate,
rejecting violence. Yet the actual school
books used in PA schools told a different
story. Now a new study from Tel Aviv
University’s Institute for National
Security Studies (INSS) has confirmed
our worst fears. Its review of PA
school curricula has found that the PA
continues to “espouse some of the worst
views against Jews and Israel in their
textbooks.” Palestinian Arab children
are still being taught to “dehumanize
Israel and Jews.” Instead of aspiring to
live peacefully next door to Israel, they
aspire to “securing Palestinian justice
over Israel’s ruins…to adhere to the
vision of ending the state of Israel.”
In fact, Israel is not even mentioned
on the maps in PA schoolbooks—
“instead, the region is referred to as
“Palestine” or “Occupied Palestine.”
The PA schoolbooks make a mockery of
concepts such as tolerance and pluralism.
They present an “antisemitic portrayal of
Jews…Jews are continuously maligned
as the enemies of Islam…Jews are
the ‘enemies of Islam in all times and
places’.” To cite just one of innumerable
examples, a standard 8th grade Arabic
Language textbook used in PA schools

“teaches reading comprehension
through a violent story that promotes
suicide bombings and exalts Palestinian
militants in the Battle of Karameh.” In
that narrative, Arab fighters “cut the
necks of enemy soldiers” and “wore
explosive belts, thus turning their bodies
into fire burning the Zionist tank.” They
celebrate “leaving behind some of the
bodies and body parts, to become food
for wild animals on land and birds
of prey in the sky.” Have you ever
wondered why countless Palestinian
Arab children participate in mobs that
try to stone and burn Jews to death? Or
why Palestinian Arab college students
always vote for pro-terrorist, antisemitic
parties in their university elections? Or
why so many young Palestinian Arabs
have enthusiastically engaged in the
most heinous acts imaginable, such as
beheading Jewish babies? The INSS
study provides the answer: because
that’s how they are raised. Every day
of their young lives, Palestinian Arab
youngsters study from textbooks that
glorify anti-Jewish terrorists and teach
antisemitic hatred. All the peace plans
that pundits and diplomats promote
mean nothing in the face of this tragic
reality. All the talk about borders and
refugees and settlements is meaningless
so long as one side raises its children
to wage a never-ending war against
Jews. Tel Aviv University’s Institute for
National Security Studies has done an
important public service by examining
the Palestinian Authority’s textbooks.
The results may be deeply disturbing,
but they help us understand the basic
reality of the Middle East today. That
reality will never change so long as
Palestinian Arab children are taught to
hate and kill Jews.
Moshe Phillips
Vues Master’s Note: History repeats
itself!

TRACHT GUT
Dear Vues Master:
While teaching in New York in 1957,
a young man from Israel received a
letter from home saying his father had

suffered a heart attack and was in critical
condition. At a time when overseas
phone calls were rare, the young man’s
anxiety was deepened by the thought
that his father may have already passed
away. Devastated, the young man
wrote a note to the Lubavitcher Rebbe
explaining the situation, ending with the
words, “I don’t even know what to think
at this point!” In his response, the Rebbe
underlined the man’s final sentence and
wrote next to it, “Shocking!!! Because
the instruction of our Sages in such
situations is well known: ‘Think good
and it will be good.’” A few tense days
passed, and finally the young man
reached his mother by phone. “How is
Father?” he asked. “He’s out of danger!”
“When did this happen?” “ Thursday
night.” After hanging up the phone, the
young man went to 770 for Mincha.
On his way out, the Rebbe turned to
him and asked, “Nu, do you have good
news for me?” “Yes!” he responded. “I
just phoned home and was told that my
father is out of danger.” “Since when?”
asked the Rebbe. “Since Thursday
night.” “And when did you begin to
‘tracht gut’?” “When the Rebbe told
me to do so,” said the young man. “And
when was that?” the Rebbe pressed
gently. “Thursday evening.” Smiling,
the Rebbe concluded, “May such things
never happen again. But you must
always remember to think positively.”
YL
Vues Master’s Note: Let’s all think of the
Geula!

Tehillim
Dear Vues Master:
I am someone that davens very
frequently at the Woodbourne shul. I
love the shul & love Rabbi Jungreis very
much. I just have one issue this summer.
Does anyone upstate know that there is a
war going on in Eretz Yisrael right now?
Why is there no tehillim being said after
every minyan at the Woodbourne shul?
There are people dying every day in the
war & we need to continue to daven to
HKBH for help.
HB

Vues Master’s Note: I have an idea. The
next time you daven at the Woodbourne
shul,Get Reshus from Rabbi Jungreis
and I think you should start leading
tehillim right after davening. Maybe if
people see you do it, the next minyan
will do the same. Ha!

AREV
Dear Vues Master:
Reb Efraim Margolios, the Matteh
Efraim, zt’l, was a giant in Torah.
He had Torah and gedulah (Torah
knowledge and wealth) since he owned
a large bank. Once, a pauper came to
the bank asking for a loan. The Matteh
Efraim gave him the shtar to sign, and
told him to find a guarantor, an arev,
who guarantees that the money will
be repaid. No one wanted to sign for
the pauper, so the pauper wrote in the
line designated for the arev, הכסף לי
,words other In .ולי הזהב נאם ה‘ צבקות
the pauper was saying that Hashem
is the arev. The Matteh Efraim had
rachmanus on the pauper and lent him
the money. One day, the Matteh Efraim
was ill, so his wife ran the bank instead
of him. When she returned home, her
husband asked her what happened at
the bank. She told him that the poritz
borrowed a large sum of money. He
knew that there wasn’t money left in
the bank that day, so he asked her how
she had money to lend. She replied that
there was a pauper who owed money,
and he paid up that day, and that’s how
she had money to lend out. The Matteh
Efraim checked the records and saw
that indeed, there was a debt from the
pauper who couldn’t find an arev. The
Matteh Efraim asked his wife whether
the pauper himself came to the bank
to pay up, or he sent someone to pay
for him. She said that the pauper sent
someone to pay for him. The Matteh
Efraim understood it must have been
Eliyahu HaNavi. He asked himself,
“Why did I have to be home today?
What did I do wrong that I missed
the opportunity to meet with Eliyahu
HaNavi?” He figured that it was
because when the pauper asked for a

loan, he told him to bring an arev. He
should have had rachmanus and given
him the money as a gift.
MBE
Vues Master’s Note: Woe! What an
amazing story!

POWER OF TEHILLIM
Dear Vues Master:
Years ago, when Rav Mordechai
Friedman, the Rosh Kollel of the
Tehilim Kollel, was just a young boy,
he was learning the Sefer of the Sh”lah
Ha’kadosh, and he saw a story that
changed his life. The Sh”lah tells of a
town where a very simple man recited
Tehillim every day. The people didn’t
recognize this as greatness, and they
didn’t think that saying Tehillim was
any type of remarkable endeavor.
When this simple man passed away, he
came to the Rav of the town in a dream,
and he had a very urgent warning. He
said, “Rebbi, you must evacuate the
town! Tomorrow night, there will be
a massacre here. Robbers will come
and burglarize all the homes and kill
everyone they find. Since I have been
saying Tehillim every day, I have
provided the town with protection, but
now that I am gone, the townspeople
are in great danger!” The Rav took
this dream very seriously. He gathered
his community the next morning, and
told them to pack up their belongings
and run to a safe place. Many people
listened, but there were some who
didn’t, and they thought that such a
simple man couldn’t have possibly
protected their town like that, and
that the message couldn’t be true.
Sadly, those who stayed behind were
killed that night. Rav Mordechai was
astounded by this story and the clear
power of Tehillim that it represented.
He immediately took it upon himself
to say Tehillim every single day, and
he continued for over 25 years without
missing!
TUT
Vues Master’s Note: It is a shame that
they did not say Tehillim them!

CHEATING
Dear Vues Master:
A blind man and one who could see
shared a bowl of cherries and agreed
that they would each take one at a
time. After a short while, the blind
man screamed: “You’re a cheat! You’re
taking three at a time.” Surprised, the
seeing man asked: “Have you suddenly
gotten vision that you can see how many
I’m taking?” The blind man replied:
“No. But since I’ve been taking two
at a time and you haven’t complained,
it’s obvious that you’re taking at least
three.”
GW
Vues Master’s Note: I am not sure who
was worse, the guy taking three or the
guy taking 2!

ANTI SEMITISM
Dear Vues Master:
Harav Hagaon R.Shlomo Miller Shlita
said, “Chazal tell us Avraham & Sarah
couldn’t have any children דרך פי על
הטבע.) naturally) The birth of Klal
Yisrael could not have happened פי על
הטבע דרך. The existence & survival
of Klal Yisrael throughout the 2,000
years in Galus is also הטבע לדרך חוץ.
All other nations, on the other hand,
rejects Nature .על פי דרך הטבע are
foreign bodies. Natural & unnatural are
opposing forces. טבע doesn’t tolerate
the” הלכה” Hence .חוץ לדרך הטבע
מהלך) course) in this world is (עשיו
)טבע( שונא ליעקב )למעלה מדרך הטבע.
the when והיה ביום ההוא – בקרוב ממש
הנהגה of this world will be מן למעלה
שלום על have will we and דרך הטבע
“.ישראל
FR
Vues Master’s Note: This letter is
Lemaalah Mi Derech Ha Teva.
FINDERS CREEPERS
Dear Vues Master:
A קמצן was half an hour late for a
meeting with a friend. “Where were
you?” his friend asked. “I took the bus
and there was an old man who lost a
$100 bill,” he answered. “What does
that have to do with you? Did you

help him look for it?” the friend asked.
“No,” the קמצן replied. “I stood on the
bill until he was מייאש. “
Vues Master’s Note: Missed an
opportunity!

TEFILLIN ADDICT
Dear Vues Master
My grandfather, Rabbi Sholom Gordon
of blessed memory, was many things.
Among those many things, he was
a self-diagnosed “Teffilin addict.”
Wherever he went, he went with a
pair of Tefillin, just in case he would
run into a fellow Jew who hadn’t yet
put on Tefillin that day. One day, as he
was making his tireless rounds through
one of three hospitals where he was the
Jewish chaplain, he asked a Jew he saw
if he would put on Tefillin. “Rabbi,”
said the man. “It’s the afternoon! You
don’t put Tefillin on in the afternoon!”
To which my grandfather responded,
“actually, on Tisha B’Av we put on
Tefillin in the afternoon.” “But Rabbi,
today is not Tisha B’Av,” said the
man. My grandfather got very serious,
looked at his beloved fellow Jew and
said, from the depths of his heart, “Any
day that a Jew doesn’t put on Tefillin is
Tisha B’Av!” May it be speedily in our
days, that this Tisha B’Av will be the
very last time we are required to wait
till the afternoon to put on our Tefillin,
may the Shechina never again cry
bitterly because one Jew forgot to put
on Tefillin, and may the entire world be
filled with happiness and holiness, joy
and celebration, peace and brotherly
love, with the coming of Moshiach
now.
Benny Friedman
Vues Master’s Note: Amen. What a
great story! Thanks for sharing.