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    SPEAK YOUR VUES WITH THE VUES MASTER

    MATH ERROR
    Dear Vues Master:
    I davened in a shteeble where I was the gabba. It was this
    past Friday night, one night after Pesach, the ninth day of
    the Omer. The baal tefillah was yodeling away and finally he reached Sefiras Ha’omer. He said the bracha “al
    Sefiras Ha’omer, hayoim…”. but then stopped abruptly.
    It seemed he didn’t know the correct day to say. Now,
    nobody is supposed to say the new number of days until
    you make a brocha. He tried guessing and he said seven
    and then ten. The crowd groaned. The So the Rebbe
    told him yesterday was the eighth day. He said shmonah osor. The crowd groaned again. This time he froze
    and stopped altogether. It seemed we would be there all
    night. I had to do something; they were Counting on
    me. So I grabbed the box of tissues on the table, yanked
    one out and ran to the Amud. I waved it in front of his
    face. He looked in bewilderment He started talking low
    but then ended in a load annoying voice, “I don’t have a
    cold. Why do I need a TISSUE!!” Suddenly the crowd
    erupted,, “Hayom TISSUE yomim B’omer!!”
    D F
    Vues Master’s Note: I am allergic to this letter! This letter is nothing to sneeze at!
    TIMING
    Dear Vues Master:
    I have a problem that I wanted to share with your readers. I’ve been davening in a shul for over twenty years.
    Recently we hired a new rabbi and this rabbi davens so
    much faster than the previous rabbi. By krias shema the
    chazzon has to rush his davening because he doesn’t
    want the tzibur to be waiting for a long time when the
    rabbi is finished. It usually takes me a tleast 45 seconds
    more than the rabbi to say krias shema & at least a minute
    more than the rabbi for Shemoneh Esrei. What should I
    do?
    PD
    Vues Master’s Note: Learn how to read and go back to
    alef bais class!
    MATZAH
    Dear Vues Master:
    I purchased twenty pounds of Matzah for Pesach this
    year and had only 13 full matzahs. I went to a different
    store over Chol Hamoed to buy another 4 lbs of Matzah
    and only got 3 more whole matzahs. Did other people out
    there have the same problem as me this Pesach?
    GT
    Vues Master’s Note: We got very holy Matzahs; they were
    all whole!
    FUND
    Dear Vues Master:
    I just want to give a big yasher koach to the Flatbush
    Community Fund & the Matzoh fund for helping Klal
    Yisroel make Pesach this year. I know personally many
    families in Flatbush & in Eretz Yisrael that would not
    have been able to make Pesach if not for these great organizations. Tizku L’mitzvot!!
    RDF
    Vues Master’s Note: May all those families be on the giving end instead of the receiving end!
    LIVE AFTER DEATH
    Dear Vues Master:
    This week we commemorate Yom Ha’Shoah- Holocaust
    Remembrance Day. Living in a time with so many privileges, “rights”, and even a homeland called Israel, can
    make one forget the past, even while factually reminiscing about it. I recently had the privilege of reading a historical, human account of a young woman who lived during those horrible times. Like many thousands of boys
    and girls her age, she grew up in an incredibly unstable
    and tragic time. The most shocking part of her writings
    was the clear portrayal of her struggles being so in unison with the timeless creation called human nature. She
    strove to be her own individual. Many viewed her and
    treated her differently, but her individuality is the reason
    why we all know her name today. Her name was Anne
    Frank. Anne Frank is a name that most people know of.
    Many even know her story. The bravery of a 13-year old young adult to this day is so incredibly astounding.
    It really is a loss that she never got to live a full life,
    but the journal that made her “live after she dies”, in her
    words, shows humanity at its worst but also at its best.
    We, of course, don’t have the challenges of the Holocaust, nor do we have anything comparable to that, thank
    G-d, but the humanity that Anne showed in her diary is
    not only a lesson that people should analyze and perhaps

    apply, but also a testament to our humanity.
    Anne Frank didn’t only write a historical
    account, she also wrote an exact and beautiful portrayal of the challenges of life. Anne
    grew up in a life of privilege. Anne grew up
    like any German-Dutch family. Anne had
    friends, birthdays, food, clothing, hobbies,
    and all the things of a normal life. The only
    “abnormal” thing was that she was Jewish.
    Is Anne Frank just a story and a historical
    figure? I think not because in our own ways
    and forms, we are all Anne Frank. We all
    have challenges in response to the different
    parts of life, people of life, or even our relationship with ourselves. Anne Frank entered
    the Secret Annexe as a normal 13-year-old
    teenage girl; she grew in two years into a
    15-year-old woman. She tackled human issues with relationships with others and oneself that some people never even think about
    in life. She grew in the words of the author
    Stephen Covey, from being dependent to
    independent to interdependent. She physically lived a short life, but she “lives after
    she dies” nevertheless.
    Yours, D S G
    Vues Master’s Note: May we never witness
    such tzaros again and be zoche to Moshiach!
    BERMUDA
    Dear Vues Master:
    The name “Bermuda” conjures up a variety
    of images. Tourists think of it as a tropical
    vacation site. Scientists ponder the disappearance of ships in the Bermuda Triangle.
    But for those concerned with the history
    of the Holocaust, Bermuda is remembered
    as the site of a notorious U.S.-British conference, eighty years ago this week, that
    was organized for the ostensible purpose
    of rescuing Jews from Hitler, but instead
    abandoned them. “All FDR Said Was ‘No’
    ” In early 1943, following the Allies’ verification of the Nazi genocide, some British
    parliament members and church leaders
    began pressing for rescue action. To appease the growing clamor, the Churchill
    and Roosevelt administrations announced
    they would hold a conference to address
    the crisis. The island of Bermuda was chosen for the gathering. Nahum Goldmann,
    cochairman of the World Jewish Congress,
    suspected the remote setting was selected
    so “it will take place practically in secret,
    without pressure of public opinion.” Jewish
    organizations asked permission to send representatives to the conference; their request
    was rejected. They sent the State Department a list of proposals for rescue action;
    the memo was ignored. Jewish congressmen
    met with President Franklin D. Roosevelt to
    suggest rescue steps, “but the answer to all
    of [our] suggestions was ‘No’,” according
    to Congressman Daniel Ellison (R-Maryland). Basking in the Sun American Jewish
    groups were alarmed that U.S. Congressman Sol Bloom (D-New York) was chosen
    as a member of the American delegation to
    Bermuda. Bloom was a staunch defender of
    FDR’s harsh policy toward Jewish refugees;
    Jewish leaders feared Bloom would serve
    as “an alibi” for the administration’s claim
    that rescue was impossible. Assistant Secretary of State Breckinridge Long wrote in
    his diary that he chose Bloom because the
    congressman was “easy to handle” and “terribly ambitious for publicity.” The Bermuda
    gathering opened on April 19, 1943, which
    coincided with the first night of Passover
    and the outbreak of the Warsaw Ghetto revolt against the Nazis. The British and U.S.
    governments decided beforehand that in
    their discussions, there would be no emphasis on the plight of the Jews, nor would
    they adopt any policies that would benefit
    Jews in particular. Nearly every rescue idea
    that was raised was shot down. The U.S.
    refused to use trans-Atlantic ships to transport refugees, not even troop supply ships
    that were returning from Europe empty. The
    Roosevelt administration also rejected any
    increase in the admission of refugees to the
    United States. The British delegates refused
    to discuss Palestine as a possible haven, because of Arab opposition. They also rejected
    negotiating with the Nazis to release Jews,
    on the grounds that “many of the potential
    refugees are empty mouths for which Hitler
    has no use.” Their release “would be relieving Hitler of an obligation to take care of
    these useless people,” a senior British official asserted. The delegates also dismissed
    the idea of shipping food to starving Jews
    as a violation of the Allied blockade of Axis
    Europe, even though Allied leaders previously made an exception for German-occupied Greece and sent food there. In the
    end, the Bermuda conferees spent a large
    amount of time on very small-scale steps,
    such as evacuating 5,000 Jewish refugees
    from Spain (who were not in immediate
    danger) to the Libyan region of Cyrenaica.
    After twelve days of basking in the tropical sunshine, the delegates adjourned without achieving anything of significance. The
    two governments kept the proceedings of
    the conference secret rather than admit how
    little they had accomplished. A Cruel Mockery The failure of the Bermuda conference
    provoked the first serious public criticism
    of U.S. refugee policy. A large advertisement in the New York Times, sponsored by
    the rescue advocates known as the Bergson Group, was headlined “To 5,000,000
    Jews in the Nazi Death-Trap, Bermuda was
    a Cruel Mockery.” Rep. Emanuel Celler
    (D-New York) charged that the delegates
    in Bermuda had engaged in “diplomatic
    tight-rope walking,” at a time when “thousands of Jews are being killed daily.” In a
    slap at Congressman Bloom, Rep. Celler
    characterized the conference as “a bloomin’
    fiasco.” The editors of The New Republic
    charged that Bermuda revealed “the bitter
    truth” that the U.S. and Great Britain were
    unwilling to aid “these potential refugees
    from murder.…If the Anglo-Saxon nations
    continue on their present course, we shall
    have connived with Hitler in one of the
    most terrible episodes of history.” Bermuda
    galvanized some mainstream Jewish leaders to speak out more forcefully for rescue.
    Dr. Israel Goldstein, president of the Synagogue Council of America, charged that
    “the victims are not being rescued because
    the democracies do not want them, and the
    job of the Bermuda conference apparently
    was not to rescue victims of Nazi terror but
    to rescue our State Department and the British Foreign Office from possible embarrassment.” Even the chief British delegate to
    Bermuda, Richard Law, later acknowledged
    that Bermuda was a “façade for inaction.”
    Historians have come to view the Bermuda
    conference as one of the era’s most vivid
    demonstrations of the Roosevelt administration’s abandonment of the Jews. The many
    books and films about America’s response
    to the Nazi genocide devote ample space to
    the Bermuda failure—with the notable exception of the recent Ken Burns documentary, “The U.S. and the Holocaust,” which
    for some reason never mentioned Bermuda
    at all. Perhaps one day, some interviewer
    will ask him about that. An Eyewitness
    Account The day the Bermuda conference
    concluded, April 30, the Jewish Telegraphic
    Agency published an extraordinary eyewitness account of Nazi atrocities against Jews
    in the Polish city of Lvov. A 40 year-old
    bank clerk named Arthur Rotenstroikin described how he and other Jews in Lvov were
    “lined up and machine gunned,” but “I fainted and fell to the ground before a bullet hit
    me and thus escaped death.” Late that night,
    he “crawled from the mound of dead and
    returned home.” Rotenstroikin recounted a
    wide range of Nazi outrages in Lvov, from
    young Jewish boys “forced to beat their parents,” to Rosh Hashana worshippers compelled to spread Torah scrolls on the ground
    “and dance upon them.” He also detailed the
    mass murder process: executions of tens of
    thousands of Jews in a nearby forest where
    “the cries of the victims could be heard for
    miles,” and mass deportations to the Belzec
    death camp. Within a year, “only 10,000
    Jews were left of [Lvov’s] original Jewish
    population of 160,000,” Rosenstroikin reported. Among the murdered were his own
    wife and two year-old child. His harrowing
    testimony offered a heartbreaking eyewitness counterpoint to the Allies’ farce of a
    conference in Bermuda.
    Rafael Medoff
    Vues Master’s Note: Oy! I could never vacation there now!
    KOL HAKAVOD
    Dear Vues Master:
    I am a weekly reader of your newspaper the
    Jewish Vues. I really enjoy the new Parsha
    Knowledge series. The Torah thoughts and
    stories on Pesach were pure gems. Kol haKovod to R’ Fingerer and please continue
    giving us readers more awesome content to
    say over at our Shabbos/yom tov tables.
    – C H L
    Vues Master’s Note: Thanks for continuing
    to support us and giving us chizuk!
    FATHER
    Dear Vues Master:
    The Shimathites and Suchatites are descendants of Yisro. The name Shimathites
    means, they heeded (sham’u) the advice of
    their father. Jeremiah (Ch. 35) records how
    Yonadav son of Reichav had commanded
    his children to drink no wine, build no houses, sow no fields nor plant any vineyards,
    but to live a life of complete simplicity in
    tents. The Suchatites lived in booths (succos) in the desert as their father had commanded. – Sotah 11a This fits into the dictum of Rav Pappa who said, before a wine
    drinker, bring wine; before a gardener, who
    usually eats vegetables, bring a basket of
    vegetables. Rashi says, it is wise to bring
    people gifts of items to which they are accustomed. – Sotah 10a Similarly, a wise
    son is someone who enjoys hearing what
    his father says; he enjoys hearing directly
    from his father and when others quote him
    or tell stories about him. An unwise son is
    someone who turns his head when his father
    speaks and thus people avoid mentioning
    dad in front of his son. You can size up a
    bachur on how he reacts when he hears the
    word dad. One who turn from his father is
    unwise as it says in Pirkei Avot 4:1, “Ben
    Zoma says, Who is wise? He who learns
    from every man.” A yeshiva student understands this to mean that he should listen to
    his rabbis and everyone else should be given
    a polite smile and nod. However, Ben Zoma
    doesn’t say “he learns from man” but “he
    learns from every man.” Had he only said
    man that would refer to one called man (like
    a rabbi); however, every man comes to include everyone and the father in particular
    as it says, “They heeded (sham’u) the advice of their father.” They were wise and

    survived. My son, like everyone else in his
    yeshiva, believes the words of their rabbi is
    like the word of G-d and my words are like
    the bark of a dog. I learned, in his yeshiva
    from the son of the founder, that this generation is lacking men and in a place where
    there are no men, strive to be a man. As
    such, I don’t think the last generation will
    be called the generation of the Rosh Yeshiva but the generation of the Avos as it says
    in Isaiah 46:10, “I foretell the end from the
    beginning” and I heard that the word תכלית
    (purpose) begins with a tov and ends with
    a tov because the beginning is the blueprint
    and the end is the product. Therefore, G-d
    started with the Avos so He will end with
    them. BTW, The middle letters spell כלי ,
    the vessel, the people and things, will make
    it come to fruition.
    DG
    Vues Master’s Note: Once again you have a
    one track mind!
    YOM HASHOAH
    Dear Vues Master:
    Yom HaShoah/Holocaust Remembrance
    Day is this week. Please take a look at the
    OpEd copied below about how a classic
    1960s American novel offered a unique
    perspective. I have been studying the
    American reaction to the Holocaust in the
    1950s and 1960s for several years now.
    HOLOCAUST REMEMBRANCE DAY &
    JEWISH SELF DEFENSE
    The best-selling novel Fail-Safe was
    brought to mind with the recent news headlines about the observance of Yom HaShoah [Holocaust Remembrance Day] and that
    a high school in Florida removed a graphic
    novel adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary
    from its library with the school administration quoted as saying it is “not age appropriate” There is a section of Fail-Safe that
    talks about the story of Anne Frank and her
    family in a way unseen before or after in
    American literature. The book was written
    by Eugene Burdick and Harvey Wheeler.
    It was later made into the 1964 film of the
    same name by Sidney Lumet and it starred
    Walter Matthau as Emil Groteschele and
    Henry Fonda as the President of the United
    States. Hank Azaria played Groteschele in
    the 2000 television remake. Here is the unedited excerpt- “One of the few times that
    his son had seen him angry was when the
    subject of the Diary of Anne Frank came up.
    Emil Groteschele had offended the Jews of
    Cincinnati by arguing that Anne Frank and
    her family had acted like imbeciles. Rather
    than hiding in an attic and clutching their
    Jewishness to them they should have made
    plans to escape. Failing that, they should
    have been prepared to fight the Nazis when
    the final day came. “The steps leading up
    to that miserable attic should have been
    red with Nazi blood-and that of the Frank
    family,” Dr. Groteschele argued bitterly. “If
    each Jew in Germany had been prepared to
    take one SS trooper with him before he was
    sent to the camps and the gas ovens, precious few Jews would have been arrested,”
    Emil Groteschele argued. “At some point
    Hitler and the SS would have stopped.
    Face it. If every Jew who was arrested had
    walked to the door with a pistol in his hand
    and started shooting at the local heroes,
    how long would the Nazis have kept it up?
    At around a few hundred they would have
    started to think twice. At a few thousand
    they would have started to shake a bit. If
    it got to twenty thousand, they would have
    called it off. But the first Jews who shuffled
    quietly off to death camps or hid like mice
    in attics were instruments of destruction of
    the rest.” This call for Jews to take up arms
    in such a manner must have shocked readers. This was years before Rabbi Meir Kahane and his JDL made headlines for their
    militant attitudes and actions. In 1941, a
    Jewish partisan leader named Abba Kovner
    issued the following statement. “Jewish
    youth! Do not trust those who are trying to
    deceive you. Hitler plans to destroy all the
    Jews of Europe…We will not be led like
    sheep to the slaughter! True, we are weak
    and defenseless, but the only reply to the
    murderer is revolt! Brothers! Better to fall
    as free fighters than to live by the mercy of
    the murderers. Arise! Arise with your last
    breath!” The leaders of the 1943 Uprising
    in the Warsaw Ghetto were moved Abba
    Kovner’s words and took up arms. When
    Israel fought for its liberation in 1948 the
    entire world saw Jews using firearms for
    their own defense on page one of newspapers. The problem now is that since Israelis
    have become so adept at combat, too many
    anti-semites at the UN want to see Jews
    put down their guns and return to the ghettos and attics. Fortunately, we know well
    enough where that leads.
    ZR
    Vues Master’s Note: But why only one day
    all of the year we should be studying!
    STORY
    Dear Vues Master:
    Rav Yitzchak Abarbanel was very close
    with the king of Spain; of course, he was
    therefore hated by the other advisers. To
    undermine him, they told the king to test
    him to see if he was really honest and trustworthy. The king agreed, so they told the
    rabbi to write down all his personal wealth
    and they would see if he tries to hide anything. After three days, the rabbi came back
    to the king with a parchment upon which
    was written that his whole fortune was
    seven hundred thousand reals ($). When
    the advisor saw that, they laughed and
    said his home alone was worth twice that.
    Also, he has fields and vineyards. The king
    was furious and wanted to have the rabbi
    killed but didn’t want a public outcry, so he
    planned to do it quietly. On the outskirts of
    town was a brick refinery that had a constant fire burning. The king wrote a letter
    to one who maintained that fire with the
    instruction that whoever hands him this paper should be thrown into the fire. He sent
    for the rabbi, gave him the sealed envelope,
    and told him to deliver it to the brick refinery immediately. The rabbi went with his
    servant to do the King’s bidding. As they
    were leaving the city, someone flagged
    them down at the crossroads. He pleaded
    with the rabbi to come with him, for his
    wife had given birth eight days earlier but
    the mohel became ill and couldn’t perform
    the bris. Could the rabbi come with him to
    do the bris so it would take place on the
    eighth day? The rabbi was in a quandary.
    He was on a mission from the king, which
    he had to complete. Yet the mitzvah of bris
    milah had to be done! How could he pass
    up a mitzvah that Hashem gave, in order to
    fulfill the commandment of a mortal king?
    He gave the letter to his servant and told
    him to deliver it while he went to do the
    bris. After the bris, he went to the refinery
    to meet his servant. When he got there, the
    head of the refinery told him that the letter
    that his servant had given him was a death
    sentence from the king. Not only that, but
    before his death the serving admitted that
    he had been stealing from the rabbi all
    these years. When the rabbi realized what
    had happened, he said about himself, “He
    who believes will know no evil (Koheles
    8:5). The next day, he went to the king.
    When the king saw him, he was shocked
    and asked him if the Rav had fulfilled his
    command. When the rabbi told the king
    what had happened, the king said, “Now
    I see that you are truly righteous, but tell
    me, what was the number you wrote?” The
    rabbi told him, “Yes, I have many more
    possessions, but those can be taken from
    me at any time. The number I wrote was
    the sum I gave to charity, which cannot be
    taken from me.” This teaches us that while
    we don’t understand Hashem’s ways, we
    must never stray or try to make up excuses
    or even frum cheshbonos (be overly pious).
    We must know what we are supposed to do
    and know that he who obeys the commandment will know no evil! – Yitzy Adlin How
    much more so when the commandment is
    relatively easy and there is a good meal.
    How many evils befall a person for not going to their father for Pesach.
    DG
    Vues Master’s Note: Nice story!
    BRIS
    Dear Vues Master:
    Before a bris milah the father says the following blessing, “Blessed are You, Lord
    our G-d, King of the universe, Who has
    sanctified us with His commandments and
    commanded us to enter my son into the
    Covenant of Avraham our father.” Everyone responds, “Amen, just as he has entered into the Covenant, so may he enter
    into Torah, into marriage, and into good
    deeds.” The question is how come “good
    deeds” is placed last and not at the beginning as good deeds are the prerequisite for
    Torah and for getting married? The reason
    is because the father, with the mother’s
    support, trains him from the very beginning to have good deeds and the blessing is
    to remind him (and us) of that. Why would
    the boy forget that his father raised him?
    He can forget when others (us) do not remind him. For instance, when he goes to
    Yeshiva and there is no talk or interest in
    kibbud av v’eim he slowly forgets about
    him as he gets “wiser” and loses respect for
    his father. When he gets married, he thinks
    to himself, “Now I am an adult and I have
    care for my wife.” so I don’t have to honor
    my father so much anymore. The people
    confirm the covenant by claiming that the
    boy should survive the rigors of life (i.e.,
    yeshiva and marriage) and grow in his respect and honor of his father. This can be
    seen in bentching (the prayer after eating
    bread). When he inserts a small prayer for
    his family he starts with his father/mother,
    wife and then children. The reason is because he is obligated to grow in his obligation in kibud av v’eim. Additional reasons
    are that he can’t divorce his parents, but he
    can his wife and “certainty” takes priority
    over “doubt.” Also, as a child becomes wiser he has to become wiser in how he does
    kibud av v’eim and not less.
    DG
    Vues Master’s Note: Oh cut it out