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WouldJew Believe #6, (by Marnie Winston-Macauley)

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 15:02:24 GMT

WouldJew Believe #6, by Marnie Winston-Macauley
A Proud Member of This Community!

by Marnie Winston-Macauley

Outrageous, odd and fascinating Jewish facts including… craters on the moon named after rabbis.

AND SPEAKING OF FISH ...

Lox, whitefish, and gefilte aren't the only major Yiddish fish. The animated hit, "Finding Nemo," is swimming in Jewish waters! Jewish actor, Brad Garrett, is the voice of Bloat (who else?), while Albert Brooks plays the nervous (what else?) Marlin, who overcomes his fears (of course) to find his captured son Nemo. The title role belonged to then nine-year-old Alexander Gould. The Jewish California native is a second generation show biz vet as his mom was a child actress. Both Alexander and his two sisters have followed suit. The young man told the Philadelphia Jewish Exponent that he "guessed Nemo was Jewish."Oh ... and he doesn't eat fish! Can you blame him?

JEWS OUT OF THIS WORLD! ...

Rabbis, rabbis, everywhere -- yes even on the moon. Or at least there are Jewish craters on the moon named for rabbis. One, "Rabbi Levi," was no doubt dubbed so to honor the 14th century Rabbi Levi ben Gershom known for his important contributions in mathematics, astronomy, and navigation. But crater-Levi is not a lone Moon Jew! Another crater was also named for a Jewish sage, 12th century Rabbi Abraham Ibn Ezra. The Spanish scholar was known for his astrological explanations for Scriptural passages. Now, all we need do is figure out how to fix a mezuzah to the entrance of these craters. Hmmm. Better call my friend Hadassah who works at NASA.

A JEW, WHO NU? ...

Who among us hasn't known, heard of, or read about someone raised gentile, later learning they were actually "one of the tribe"? Most famous, perhaps, is former Secretary of State Madeline Albright who was said to have learned she was Jewish in 1997. As a writer, I've researched many such "revelations" -- from Conversos who were often told the truth on their bubbes' deathbed, to an entire village with oddly unquestioned Jewish traditions (Venhaver, Portugal). So imagine my surprise when John Stossel, anchor of ABC's "20/20," specials, and author of books exposing myths and lies, told me a life story which just may have contributed to his passion for the truth. Stossel didn't know he was Jewish until he was a teen! Raised in the Congregational Church, he said, "One day I made a remark about a Jewish boy picking his nose - and my brother said 'what the heck do you thing you are?'" Although his mother claimed she told him of their heritage, he doesn't recall hearing this information. He embraced Judaism at about age 30. His wife is Jewish, and his brother-in-law is a Jewish activist. The Stossel family even observes the Sabbath! Whew! Another "myth" uncovered. Hey John, got a job for me over at 20/20? John??

RELATIVITY THEORIES? ...

Most of us know (and tell our children) that Albert Einstein was no prize in school and was backward in speech and in math. Naturally, Albert, born in Ulm Donnau, Germany in 1879, worried his parents, Hermann and Pauline. The Einstein family pow-wowed and pondered the reason. And so, the interest in Albert's head began - first to explain his deficiencies, then later, to explain his genius. Little Al's grandmother thought her grandson's head was much too fat, while Mama Pauline, worried that her child's head was lopsided. "Alright, OK, so he'll take violin lessons," must have run through her head when she insisted her child, the nebekhl, study the instrument. When Einstein died, his brain was removed without permission and in contravention of Jewish law by Dr. Thomas Harvey in 1955. Einstein, one of the greatest minds of the 20th century and creator of the Theory of Relativity, was found to have a brain that looked much like any other -- gray, crinkly, and, if anything, a trifle smaller than average.

IS THIS A JOB FOR A JEWISH GIRL? ...

With the Olympics in full swing, I'm reminded of a conversation I had with Melanie Strug, mother of gold medalist, Kerri Strug. In 1996, the tiny 17-year-old Jewish athlete became a hero. At the Summer Olympics in Atlanta, the only way the United States' Women's Gymnastics team could win their first-ever gold medal, depended upon Kerri's final vault. In her first vault, she fell, tearing ligaments, and spraining her left ankle. Barely able to walk, Kerri readied ... then nailed an almost perfect landing, and the gold for the Team. For most moms, this would be enough, no? But to Jewish mom Melanie, "School was most important. I thought you can't make a career out of gymnastics." And she made sure her daughter was prepared. "When she moved away from home [Arizona] to study gymnastics in Houston (with famed coach Bela Karoly],at age 13, we were devastated. Before we made the decision to let her go, we went to Houston to check this out." Mrs. Strug wasn't thrilled. "A lot of the kids let school slide. School was always number one with us. Gymnastics was not going to be her future." Mom's planning paid off. In addition to Olympic Gold, Kerri holds a B.A. in Communications and a Masters Degree from Stanford. When I spoke with Kerri, she was with the Justice department's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. The lesson? Gold may tarnish, but learning lasts a lifetime. Now, that's what I call a "Golden Rule!"

Marnie Winston-Macauley is the author of "Yiddishe Mamas: The Truth About the Jewish Mother" and "A Little Joy, A Little Oy," the book and 2009 calendar which you can order on Amazon or pick up at your local bookstore.

Author Biography:

Marnie is author of the advice column, "Ask Sadie." She has written over 20 books and calendars, including, "Yiddishe Mamas: The Truth About the Jewish Mother" and "A Little Joy, A Little Oy." She wrote for "As the World Turns," (Emmy and Writers Guild nomination). She starred in her own radio show and a Discovery pilot. Marnie is in "Who's Who in America," 2007.

This article can also be read at: http://www.aish.com/jewlariousFunnyStuff/jewlariousFunnyStuffDefault/WouldJew_Believe_6.asp Note- If you enjoyed this article, please use the link above to Aish's website and leave a comment at the bottom of the article.

Aish.com New Blogs & Videos - August 19, 2008

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 00:13:53 GMT

18 - 23 August 2008	Weekly Torah Portion: Ekev

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What's new at Aish.com — Enjoy this week's online articles and features

Going for Gold
by Emuna Braverman
What a difference 1/100th of a second makes!

The House Always Wins
by Lori Palatnik
When one spouse is more committed Jewishly than the other.

No Child Left Behind
by Rabbi Yaakov Salomon
Implications of the three year old left at the airport

The Sleep-Away Camp Challenge
by Emuna Braverman
Camp requires one of the biggest parenting challenges of all -- leaving our kids alone.

The Jewish Ethicist - Business with Friends
by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir, Business Ethics Center of Jerusalem
Even a friendly agreement should be carefully elaborated.

Consider Yourself a Ten out of Ten
by Rabbi Zelig Pliskin
A master sales trainer's advice.

Way #28 Protect What Is Precious
by Rabbi Noah Weinberg
A fence keeps a safe distance from danger. Take precautions. If you find a "hole" in your life, build a fence to avoid stumbling into errors.

The Original Jewish Olympics
by Mark Miller
Thought the Greeks invented the Olympics? Think again.

WouldJew Believe #6
by Marnie Winston-Macauley
Outrageous, odd and fascinating Jewish facts including… craters on the moon named after rabbis.

In Good Company
by Jewlarious.com Staff
Have corporations lost touch with consumers?

Click here to read an array of articles on the Weekly Torah Portion

The Counterfeiters (by Estee Reider and Rachel Ginsberg)

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:03:19 GMT

The Counterfeiters
by Estee Reider and Rachel Ginsberg

by Estee Reider and Rachel Ginsberg

Germany's highly guarded counterfeiting scheme aimed at toppling the British economy.

Germany',s highly guarded counterfeiting scheme aimed at toppling the British economy.

The Academy Award-winning Austrian film, The Counterfeiters, recreates the German counterfeiting scheme toward the end of WWII, aimed at toppling the British economy. Out of 143 Jews employed in the secret operation, four are still alive. Avraham Sonnenfeld, 82, the youngest of the counterfeiters, speaks about the Germans' most highly guarded plot.

Avraham Sonnenfeld does not have the telltale blue tattoo on his forearm. But he does not need this reminder to recall the horrors of the Holocaust. Day by day, he relives his tortured existence in the Nazi labor camps, especially the terror that constantly gripped him in Barracks 19 in Camp Sachsenhausen. "The conditions there were far better than that of our fellow Jews in other camps. Nevertheless, we harbored no hope. Knowing that the moment our project was completed they would destroy us made us live in constant fear. They wouldn't dare leave us alive."

Sonnenfeld, who came from a family of printers in Transylvania, was selected by the SS to participate in one of the greatest deceptions of all times - the Nazi scheme to destabilize the British economy by flooding the country with huge quantities of counterfeit bills.

"Operation Bernhard," named after the officer in charge of it, Bernhard Kruger, is the central theme of The Counterfeiters, a film that sheds light on one of the most audacious, brazen chapters of World War II.

Among the 143 Jews chosen to participate in this operation were craftsmen, artists, graphic artists, and printers, all of them transferred from death camps. Four of the original 143 counterfeiters are still known to be alive: Adolf Burger, a 91-year-old Czech Jew who wrote the 1983 memoir The Devil's Workshop, on which the film is based; Jack Lefler who lives in Berlin; Avraham Sonnenfeld, now 82, the youngest of the group and therefore nicknamed Der Yungster; and Avraham Krakowski, a chassidic Jew whose 1994 memoir, Counterfeit Lives, was published by CIS as part of their Holocaust Diaries series. Krakowski, now 89, suffered several strokes in recent years and is unable to communicate.

Adolf Burger took a job in a printing house in Bratislava in 1938. During World War II, before Slovakia began deporting its Jewish citizens to concentration camps in 1942, Burger received a deportation waiver as someone with skills indispensable for the country's economy. Working with Resistance members, Burger began to print false baptismal certificates for Jews scheduled for deportation, which stated that they were Roman Catholic from birth or had been baptized before the war. Holders of such documents were spared deportation. The Nazis discovered Burger's underground activity, and he was deported to Auschwitz in 1942 with his wife of seven months, who was murdered soon after. He was assigned to work at the new arrivals selection ramps, and his life was spared when Bernhard Kruger discovered his talent for forgery.

"For years, I was silent. I didn't want to speak about this anymore," Burger said. "It was only when the neo-Nazis started with their lies about Auschwitz that I began to travel through Germany and give my speeches, to tell people what happened."

But before Austrian filmmaker Stefan Ruzowitzky adapted Adolf Burger's memoir, a British film producer named Marc Ezra approached Avraham Krakowski's family for rights to his story, which was loaded with personal drama. Krakowski, a Radomsker chassid and outstanding Torah scholar, was shipped off to Auschwitz together with his fiance, and were dramatically reunited after the war. On the train to Auschwitz, Avraham Krakowski gave Pola, his kallah, a diamond ring, a gold watch-chain and four hundred German marks which he took from the lining of his pants. "Take these," he told her. "They may save your life someday."

Indeed they did. Pola, on the brink of death from typhus, dragged herself outside her barracks and traded the ring and the watch-chain for four carrots and a ration of bread. For Ezra, this was great big-screen material. But the family ultimately refused the offer. They didn't want their parents' personal miraculous redemption turned into a Hollywood love story.

"He always talked about the war," says his daughter Rina Rieger. "He believed it was imperative to share God's miracles." The war, she says, was always part of her too. "I remember as a three year old in New York, wandering around the house looking for a place to hide from the Nazis."

On the train to Auschwitz, knowing he was going to a place from which few, if any, would come out alive, Avraham Krakowski committed to keeping three mitzvot under all circumstances. He pledged never to eat bread with out first washing, to always eat the melave malkah meal even if it only consisted of a crumb of bread; and, mindful of the opinion that whoever recites Kiddush Levanah will be protected from harm during the entire month, committed to recite this prayer at the beginning of every month.

Wanted: Printers and Gardeners

World War II was barely two weeks underway when the heads of the Nazi Party convened together with Germany's financial experts, on Wilhelmstrasse No. 16. The scheme formulated on that 18th of December, 1939, was simple: to order the Bank of the Third Reich to print up millions of Sterling notes, to release them by parachute over British skies and stand by gleefully and watch the enemy economy disintegrate. The idea of counterfeiting the enemy's money did not originate with the Nazis; in fact, similar notions had been toyed with around the tables of Churchill and Roosevelt.

One hundred and fifty years before, during the French Revolution, the British government minted bogus Revolutionist coins, to fuel the already spiraling inflation. In the 18th century, Friedrich the Great, who created Greater Germany out of many Prussian principalities, had no qualms about forging fake enemy currency to undermine his foes. But these tricks took place before the Industrial Revolution. The idea here was that by the time the massive war machine of Adolf Hitler would be ready for the all-out onslaught, the job would be so much easier and simpler than in the past.

The Nazis discovered, however, that carrying out the operation wouldn't be simple. SS Officer Bernhard Kruger, who was appointed to oversee the project, chose his manpower from Jewish artisans and printing experts. For him, the profit was twofold: highly professional cheap labor, as well as invisible collaborators who would not be around to tell the tale. The plan was to eliminate them immediately after completion of the work.

Here is where the paths of Kruger and the Sonnenfeld family converged, to their mutual benefit - Nazi ambitiousness and Divine protection for the Jewish family.

Grandfather Sonnenfeld owned a publishing house in Transylvania - then part of Hungary, today part of Romania - the business end of which he transferred to his two sons. At the time, national borders between these countries were somewhat ambiguous, but all this changed in the spring of 1944, when the German army invaded Hungary and Adolf Eichmann was personally authorized with the annihilation of the Hungarian Jewish population.

"Then the change was very rapid," Sonnenfeld reminisces. "Within a month, we were forced to wear the yellow star patch and a month later, we were corralled into a ghetto. By the following month, we were already en route to Auschwitz." There, Sonnenfeld saw his stepmother (his biological mother had passed away when he was a year old), aunt, and sister wrenched away from the family. His young cousin refused to be parted from his mother and Mengele sent him to the gas chamber as well.

"They separated the men and women and that was the last we ever saw of them. We were taken, two days later, for forced labor in an Austrian quarry - from which no one returned. None of those I knew, friends and neighbors who were with us on that transport, survived to tell the grisly tale.

"At the very last moment, before we were all shipped off to that vale of death, the Germans asked us if there were any professionals among us, in any field. Gardeners and printers were ordered to step forward. I have no idea what they did with the gardeners, but we were taken to a huge print shop which had been set up in Auschwitz. We were tested to see if we really knew how to operate the presses."

The Greeting Card Exam

At the time, the Sonnenfelds had no idea what the Germans had in mind for them, nor did they have any idea how to convince the Germans that they really knew how to operate printing machinery. "My grandfather had owned the print shop and knew all about the actual printing process, but my father and uncle had only managed the business end. As for me, I was a student. My only acquaintance with the mechanics was from a brief introduction during the vacation break between eleventh and twelfth grades. To my relief and luck, the German 'exam' was short and superficial, and our combined knowledge was enough."

Sonnenfeld recalls that "entrance examination" to this day. "They told us to print up a greeting card. Not knowing how or where to begin, I busied myself cleaning the press on the outside, to appear as if I knew what I was doing. Apparently, our supervisors were no great experts, either, because somehow, we passed that test."

The group of printers left Auschwitz the same way they had come - by train. His father and uncle, who had arrived at Auschwitz beribboned with medallions they had garnered for their service in World War I, left it, like all the rest, in striped prisoners' pajamas. "The only difference in our mode of travel this time was that we each had a seat. The trains were heavily guarded by SS officers, but they were a grade higher than the previous human cattle cars."

Along the way, the group was joined by Jewish artists and graphic experts, including Adolf Burger. This trip was the first time the Nazis had referred to him as Herr Burger, but that, having just lost his entire family, he sat in total apathy throughout the journey. He weighed in at 77 lbs (35 kg). A large sign over their new "home" read: "Camp Sachsenhausen."

"Sachsenhausen boasted 8,000 victims, because of its proximity to Berlin. Today, Israeli heads of state and officials are taken there for guided tours. We were housed in Barracks 18 and 19, in a special barbed wire area, totally isolated from the rest of the prisoners."

And there they learned the purpose of their relocation: Operation Counterfeit. The project was so well-guarded that even the SS officers in the camp knew nothing about it. Only those who kept watch over Barracks 18 and 19 had inside information. The Jews in these two barracks noticed that Bernhard Kruger, the SS officer supervising them, had chosen only Jews.

Kruger was experienced in forgery. He had already forged British postage stamps with anti-Jewish and anti-Soviet messages, implemented through prisoners from occupied European countries, including Jews. But this counterfeit money was to be produced exclusively by Jews.

"They treated us fairly decently, meanwhile. We slept on beds rather than on bunk boards and got relatively good food - though by the end of the war, I still weighed less than 95 lbs., so it was no hotel. If someone got sick, he was removed, supposedly to the infirmary or hospital but we knew that he was permanently eliminated. The Nazis couldn't afford to risk any information leaking out."

According to Sonnenfeld, Kruger would even refer to them in the formal deferential German third person, expecting them to fully cooperate and progress efficiently. The moment they failed to keep to schedule, he threatened to take out some men and put them to death. "We knew that death was only a question of time."

The project was complex, requiring the right paper, making a watermark, preparing printing plates and breaking the special code which the British used for serializing the numbers on their bills. But by the end of the war, the Germans had succeeded in forging some nine million bills, with a face value amounting to 135 million pounds Sterling. The forgery was so close to perfect that the bills were hardly distinguishable from the real thing.

Burger's book describes how Kruger paid a visit to the barracks one morning in 1943, drew a bill from his pocket and waving it aloft, announced, "This forged bill was accepted by the Bank of England itself." The men in the bloc knew they had just gotten a new lease on life.

The Nazi's original intention was simply to release huge numbers of bills over British skies, knowing that people wouldn't be able to resist using them as good cash. This scheme never materialized because, in 1943, the tide of the war turned against the Nazis and they needed the money for more pressing purposes such as importing strategic raw materials and paying their spies. Some of this money may also have gone to finance the rescue of deposed Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, in September 1943, from his imprisonment on a mountain peak in the Apennines.

Survival or Sabotage

""When we came to work on the project, they were almost finished with the British pound notes and were beginning to produce dollars," says Sonnenfeld. "They had a serious technical problem with the dollar, however. Today the problem could be solved with sophisiticated computer technology, but then it was insurmountable.

"In an attempt to make a breakthrough, the Nazis brought a forger and swindler to our camp - a Russian Jew named Salomon Smolianoff, but he was equally at a loss to solve their problem.

"Our work was not particularly professional," he says, somewhat apologetically. "I believe there was some sabotage, too, on the part of the printers. Being the youngest, I was left out of most of the intrigue. But I do believe that one of our group supervised our work and made sure that we weren't too efficient so that they would no longer need us - or too inefficient, in which case they would also get rid of us. Today, the world talks about us in idealistic terms, depicting us as determined to sabotage the Nazi war effort. I, personally, did not encounter that. We were all there with one purpose in mind: to survive."

"The film director wanted to make the conflict of conscience one of the central themes," says Rena Rieger, Krakowski's daughter. "This was good for the film, but I know it wasn't an issue with my father. The issue was not conscience. The issue was survival. In all the camps, anyone who wasn't being killed was put into forced labor for the war effort. Although my father was involved in such a major sinister activity, that, I think, was incidental. My father's mantra was, 'We will outlive them and leave a legacy.' "

Sonnenfeld says it is naïve to think that if the group had succeeded in printing dollars, the Nazis would have won the war. "At this stage, even we knew that they were losing, that it was only a matter of time before the Allies took over. We were worried whether they would decide to liquidate us before that happened. It was known that the greater their losses at the front, the more Jews the Nazis destroyed, with a demonic vengeance."

When the Allied forces approached Sachsenhausen, the team of forgers were transferred to the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria. "They loaded us on open train cars, together with all the machinery, without telling us where we were headed. So long as we remained together with the crates and machines, we felt safe and optimistic. When we got close to the camp, this optimism disappeared, since we knew that this was no labor camp; it contained the gas chambers meant for annihilation."

At the very last moment, just before the SS was about to round up the group and liquidate them - they were miraculously saved. The officers in charge decided to transfer them to Ebensee, an Austrian sub-camp of Mauthausen, constructed with underground tunnels and chambers for special clandestine projects, such as the development of missiles and the production of counterfeit money. The SS officers had only one truck for the transportation of workers to Ebensee, and had to do the transporting in three shifts. On the third round, the driver, who knew the Allies were on their tail and didn't want to be caught making another transport, poured motor oil into the gas tank so that the engine jammed. The guards, however, made the prisoners march there on foot. One part of this group did not keep apace with the rest. By the time they caught up, the guards had fled, leaving them to their own resources.

"We finally arrived at Ebensee, but the Jews, who had already seized control there, wouldn't let us in. We looked too good to them, too well fed, too clean. They refused to believe we were Jews. After two days, the Allies came to liberate us and the rest of the 16,000 Jewish prisoners in the camp." Avraham Sonnenfeld, his father and his uncle (all the women in the family had been murdered) returned to their city in Hungary. They got back their print shop, but they did not resume operating it. In 1948, after his father died, Sonnenfeld made Aliyah, got married and built a family.

Kruger remains a figure shrouded in controversy. After the war, he was caught and interrogated by the French and the British. He was sent back to Germany and stood trial in 1950, but was exonerated since a number of Jewish survivors testified that he saved their lives. He lived in Frankfurt as a respected citizen, working in the very paper company that had supplied the paper for the forgeries, and died in 1989. Burger says that he was a murderer, personally responsible for shooting five of his friends.

What the Lake Hid

With defeat staring them in the face, the Nazis packed up all their paraphernalia, including printers' plates and counterfeit bills, into crates which they dumped into Lake Toplitz, the deepest, most isolated lake in Austria.

Toward the end of the war, they also cast chests of Nazi gold into its depths, gold which they had looted from conquered European countries. Ever since the end of the war, this has been a lodestone for treasure hunters. In 1959, a search party funded by the German weekly Stern succeeded in dredging up chests of counterfeit money with a face value of 72 million British pounds, from the depths of the lakebed. The Austrian government hired an American company of treasure divers to search for the gold purported to be sunken there; it has been working on the project since 2005.

"Burger also organized a search party of divers which found, among other things, a chest containing a list with the names of the 143 Jews who worked on the counterfeiting project. The name 'Sonnenfeld' appears three times - mine, my father's and my uncle's."

The Bank of England was onto the forgery, during the war, when one of the clerks discovered that a note submitted for exchange had, according to bank records, already been paid. (These bills were also used as promissory notes to be cashed for gold, which the bank made good on request from the holder.) By the end of the war, the government had learned the full story behind the Nazi scheme.

These bills were never dropped from the sky en masse, as had been planned, so that no widespread damage took place. However, since the false bills from Operation Bernhard continued to circulate in the following years, the Bank of England decided to take notes out of circulation altogether and print up new ones that looked different.

Avraham Sonnenfeld does not need the recent publicity in order to remember that chapter of his life. But he does believe in the importance of the story being told. "I was the youngest there. Now I'm 82. Soon, no one will be left to tell the tale."

This article originally appeared in copyright Mishpacha Magazine

This article can also be read at: http://www.aish.com/holocaust/people/The_Counterfeiters.asp

Aish.com New Articles - August 17, 2008‏

Sun, 17 Aug 2008 15:54:57 GMT

17 - 23 August 2008	Weekly Torah Portion: Ekev

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What's new at Aish.com — Enjoy this week's online articles and features

Sherri and Seth Mandell
by aish.com
Bringing light from the darkest cave.

From Bear Stearns to Bava Metzia
by Andrew Neff
The five key lessons I learned from the sudden dissolution of my company.

Meeting Mr. Perfect
by Batsheva Hirschman Frankel
What do you say to the man of your dreams?

Early Existential Perceptions
by Yehoshua Serkez
Back on that lonely, star-filled night when I was a eight years old, I felt that everything was rotten and nobody cared.

Speak Nicely
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Audi Weitz has a few things she wants to tell the world.

Why Not Intermarry?
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Isn't it racist not to intermarry?

This is Apartheid?
by Rabbi Warren Goldstein
When the Arab world is ready to make peace, Israel will be there.

#1 - Know There is a God
by Rabbi Noah Weinberg
Cultivate the greatest possible relationship with the greatest possible benefits.

Click here to read an array of articles on the Weekly Torah Portion

The Jewish Ethicist - Discounts (by Rabbi Dr Asher Meir)

Sun, 17 Aug 2008 04:40:44 GMT

The Jewish Ethicist - Discounts
by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir, Business Ethics Center of Jerusalem

by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir, Business Ethics Center of Jerusalem

A Jewish view on fair pricing.

Q. I have a standard price list, but I'm pretty liberal about giving discounts when I need to make a sale. Is this a problem?

A. Adam Smith noted that economic progress is dependent "a certain propensity in human nature," namely "the propensity to truck, barter, and exchange one thing for another". After all, Smith notes; "Nobody ever saw a dog make a fair and deliberate exchange of one bone for another with another dog."

However, people nowadays seem to prefer facing predictable prices over having to haggle over every exchange, and so most sellers today have standard prices which apply equally to all customers.

The Jewish approach to "fair" pricing is very lenient. There is no fair price doctrine in Jewish law, and except for a few regulated staples a seller is allowed to charge any price he likes for his wares. At the same time, the Jewish approach to transparent pricing is very strict. The demand for a transparent pricing policy stems from two distinct though related prohibitions: the prohibition on overcharging, known as onaah, and the prohibition on misleading practices, known as geneivat da'at.

The prohibition on overcharging, or underpaying, is learned from the following verse: "When you sell to your fellow or buy from the hand of your fellow, don't oppress each man his brother" (Leviticus 25:14). From the context of the verse we see that the "oppression" refers to overcharging, and the rabbis inferred that it applies equally to underpaying. However, this prohibition is breached only when the price deviates significantly from the customary market price without the customer's knowledge. If the seller says, "Other stores sell this object for ten dollars, but I won't sell it for less than 20", there is no onaah. (Likewise if a customer tells the seller, other stores are selling this item for ten dollars but I'm only willing to give you five.) Since the prohibition is contingent on the buyer's reasonable expectations, and can be waived, we see that the main emphasis is on transparency.

A separate transgression is known as geneivat da'at. This is breached when the buyer is misled regarding the price of an object, even if the price itself is fair or even a bargain. A classic case of geneivat da'at in a commercial context would be advertising a product as on sale when it is selling at its usual price, or even advertising "50% off" when there is a genuine discount but it is more modest.

In your case, there is no problem if you generally charge a particular price but once in a while you show flexibility for someone who is needy or particularly stubborn, etc. The average customer is justified in believing that he is paying the going price. Assuming the law allows it, you can also decide to give discounts to a particular class of customers: local residents, college students, soldiers, etc. If you publicize these discounts, then anyone who frequents your place of business knows the score.

The problem is if the exception becomes the rule and you make so many "discounts" that the list price is only for suckers. I was once in a clothing store with a prominent sign saying that all prices are non-negotiable. The sign should have made me suspicious, because normal stores where the prices really are non-negotiable don't have signs like that. Anyway, it turns out that even without any negotiation on my part the salesman offered me "discounts" on everything I bought - discounts that still left the prices a bit above what was accepted in other stores. Anyone who paid the label price would have been ripped off not only relative to other stores, but even in relation to what other customers were paying in the same store.

Besides the ethical concern there is also a practical one. When you are too flexible with your pricing you open yourself up to constant demands for discount which can wreck your markup.

So it is okay for you to offer an occasional discount to make a sale, but you should try to make sure that they remain truly occasional.

Send your queries about ethics in the workplace to jewishethicist@aish.com

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The Jewish Ethicist presents some general principles of Jewish law. For specific questions and direct application, please consult a qualified Rabbi.

The Jewish Ethicist is a joint project of Aish.com and the Business Ethics Center of Jerusalem. To find out more about business ethics and Jewish values for the workplace, visit the Business Ethics Center of Jerusalem at www.besr.org.

Author Biography:

See The Jewish Ethicist's Archives

Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir is Research Director at the Business Ethics Center of Jerusalem. Rabbi Dr. Meir received his PhD in Economics from MIT, and previously at Harvard. He subsequently studied at various Israeli yeshivot, and received his ordination from the Israeli Chief Rabbinate. Prior to moving to Israel, he worked at the Council of Economic Advisers in the Reagan administration. Rabbi Dr. Meir is also a Senior Lecturer in Economics at the Jerusalem College of Technology and has published several articles on the subjects of modern business and economics and Jewish law.

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This article can also be read at: http://www.aish.com/societyWork/work/The_Jewish_Ethicist__-_Discounts.asp

Way #27 Happiness (by Rabbi Noah Weinberg)

Sun, 17 Aug 2008 04:35:09 GMT

Way #27 Happiness
by Rabbi Noah Weinberg

by Rabbi Noah Weinberg

You can have everything and still be miserable. Or you can have relatively little and feel very rich. Happiness is a state of mind. Develop tools for how to get it.

You can have everything and still be miserable. *or* you can have relatively little and feel very rich. Happiness is a state of mind. Develop tools for how to get it.

Please have in mind that your study of "48 Ways to Wisdom" is on behalf of a complete recovery for Rabbi Noah Weinberg -- Yisrael Noach ben Hinda.

To receive "48 Ways to Wisdom" as a weekly email, enter your email address in the orange box on the right.

A young man once came to meet me in Jerusalem. He had an unusually happy disposition, so I asked him what's his secret. He told me:

"When I was 11 years old, I received a gift of happiness from God.
"I was riding my bicycle when a strong gust of wind blew me onto the ground into the path of an oncoming truck. The truck ran over me and cut off my leg.
"As I lay there bleeding, I realized that I might have to live the rest of my life without a leg. How depressing! But then I realized that being depressed won't get my leg back. So I decided right then and there not to waste my life despairing.
"When my parents arrived at the hospital they were shocked and grieving. So I told them: 'I've already adapted. Now you also have to get used to this.'
"Ever since then, I see my friends getting upset over little things: their bus came late, they got a bad grade on a test, somebody insulted them. But I just enjoy life."

At age 11, this young man attained the clarity that it is a waste of energy to focus on what you are missing. And that the key to happiness is to take pleasure in what you have.

Sounds simple, doesn't it?

Sameach bi'chelko literally means "satisfaction with one's portion." Happiness is achievable. So why are so many people unhappy? We lack the right tools.

HAPPINESS IS A STATE OF MIND

Western society commonly perceives happiness as the outcome of what you achieve and acquire.

"My whole life would improve if I had a new car..."
"I just need a better job and then I can relax and be happy."
"If only I met the right girl..."

You get the car and what happens? For a whole week you're walking on air. Then you go right back to being unhappy.

Sound familiar?

Happiness is not a happening. Happiness is a state of mind. You can have everything in the world and still be miserable. Or you can have relatively little and feel unbounded joy.

The Talmud says: "Who is rich? The one who appreciates what he has." (Pirkei Avot 4:1)

That's why the morning prayers begin with a series of blessings thanking God for the simple and obvious:

Thank you, God, for giving me life.
Thank God I can see.
Thank God I can use my hands and feet.
Thank God I can think.

Once you master the art of noticing, appreciating and consciously enjoying what you already have, then you will always be happy.

MAKE YOUR TROUBLES INSIGNIFICANT

You are standing on the 70th floor of the Empire State Building, gazing at the cityscape. Suddenly a rather large man brusquely pushes past you, wrenches the window open and announces his intention to jump.

You yell out: "Stop! Don't do it!"
The 6-foot-5 figure perched by the window turns to you and menacingly says, "Try to stop me and I'll take you with me!"
"Umm ... No problem, sir. Have a safe trip. Any last words?"
He says, "Let me tell you my troubles. My wife left me, my kids won't talk to me, I lost my job and my pet turtle died. So why should I go on living?"
Suddenly you have a flash of inspiration.
"Sir, close your eyes for a minute and imagine that you are blind. No colors, no sights of children playing, no fields of flowers, no sunset. Now imagine that suddenly there's a miracle. You open your eyes and your vision is restored! Are you going to jump - or will you stick around for a week to enjoy the sights?"
"I'll stay for a week."
"But what happened to all the troubles?"
"Ah, I guess they're not so bad. I can see!"

An eyeball is worth at least 5 million dollars. You have two of them? You're rich!

If you really appreciate your eyesight, then the other miseries are nothing.

Yet if you take it all for granted, then nothing in life will ever truly give you joy.

MISCONCEPTIONS ON THE ROAD TO HAPPINESS

Misconception #1: "Once I know the tools for being happy, then it will work like magic."

Don't expect the results to come automatically. It is possible to intellectually understand how to attain happiness, yet not put it into practice.

In fact, many people might actually prefer to be comfortable and unhappy, rather than endure the discomfort of changing their habits.

Just as learning any new skill requires effort, you have to be willing to invest serious effort to achieve real happiness.

Misconception #2: "If I become content and satisfied with what I have, I'll lose my motivation to achieve more."

Happiness doesn't drain your energy. It adds more!

Ask a happy person: "I have a boat. Do you want to go fishing?"
He'll say, "Great! Let's go!"
Now ask someone who is depressed: "C'mon, let's go fishing!"
He'll say, "I'm tired. Maybe tomorrow. And anyway, it might rain..."

Happy people are energetic and ambitious. There's never enough time to do everything they want to do.

Misconception #3: "Happiness is optional. If I want to be depressed, that's my own prerogative."

A beautiful Sunday afternoon. You're at the park having a picnic with your friends.

Suddenly the air is pierced by one person complaining: "Who forgot the forks? It's too hot for volleyball. I want to go home already."

You have an obligation to be happy when your mood is negatively affecting others. Don't spoil the fun.

We all try to put on a happy face when we're at a party. But what about when we are at home, with our kids? Or when we trudge into the office on Monday morning?

Like an open pit in the middle of the road, a "sour puss" is a public menace. Being happy is part of being considerate to the people around us.

THE DAILY PLEASURE COUNT

To begin appreciating life, pinpoint some things you are extremely grateful for and count them every morning for one month, e.g.: your eyes, your hands, your children, your cat.

Set a time each day to contemplate these pleasures. Feel gratitude for them. This exercise can change the mood of even the most miserable amongst us:

The next time you visit your aunt (the one who loves to complain), tell her very respectfully:

"Auntie, I came here to suffer with you today. But before we suffer, it is only fair that you also share with me five pleasures that you had today."
"I had no pleasures."
"Auntie, did you have coffee for breakfast?"
"Yes."

Don't let her off the hook with this perfunctory answer. Make her share the pleasure.

"Was it sweet? Warm? Did the aroma linger? Did it give you energy?" (She'll comply because she wants her turn to complain...)
"Okay, it was sweet and it was nice."
"Great Auntie! Now four more!"
"I didn't have any more."
"Did you wash your face? Was it pleasant? Warm? Refreshing?"

Relive it with her. Then another one.

After she describes five pleasures, her complaints won't be nearly as bad.

To really work at this, sit down with your spouse (or roommate) every evening and discuss one pleasure that each of you had that day. At the very least, you'll have a happier spouse or roommate!

Incorporate this into your family routine so that your children also learn to appreciate their daily pleasures.

THE ONE-HOUR BLESSING-FEST

The next exercise is more sophisticated.

Spend one hour writing down everything for which you are grateful.

Most people fly through the first 15 minutes. The next 15 minutes the pen moves more slowly. The next 15 minutes get even tougher, but you can pull through if you include your eyebrows and socks...

The last 15 minutes are excruciating.

Once the list is compiled, add one new blessing each day.

The power of this exercise is clear: You must be conscious of all your blessings, in order to appreciate whatever new blessings come your way.

PRIORITIZE YOUR BLESSINGS

To really hone your skills and become an expert at appreciation, prioritize your list.

-- Which is more valuable - your hands or your feet?
-- Eyes or ears?
-- Sense of taste or your sense of touch?

Comparing each pleasure forces you to qualify the various subtle aspects of each pleasure. And to quantify how much each respective pleasure gives you.

Follow this course and work at it daily. Your gratitude will continue to grow, building a solid foundation for a lifetime of happiness.

WHY IS "HAPPINESS" A WAY TO WISDOM?

Happiness is energy and power for living.
Focus on what you have and you'll be happy. Focus on what you don't have and you'll be miserable.
Happiness is not the goal in life; it is a means to tap your inner energy in order to accomplish your potential.
Happy people are healthy, optimistic, and have more driving force to achieve.
Happiness is not "living in a state of semi-depression." That's mere survival.
Happiness is in your control. By not controlling it, you are slave to your emotions.
Happiness requires discipline, determination and hard work.
Happiness is not a "happening." Don't wait for it to happen. Go out and create it.

Author Biography:
Rabbi Noah Weinberg is the dean and founder of Aish HaTorah International. Over the last 40 years, his visionary educational programs have brought hundreds of thousands of Jews closer to their heritage.

This article can also be read at: http://www.aish.com/spirituality/48ways/Way_27_Happiness.asp

Not In Kansas Anymore (by Ester (Ellen) Katz Silvers)

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 19:26:10 GMT

Not In Kansas Anymore
by Ester (Ellen) Katz Silvers

by Ester (Ellen) Katz Silvers

Somewhere over the rainbow I landed in the land of Israel

Growing up in the sixties, I, like countless other youngsters, looked forward to that special Sunday evening every spring when The Wizard of Oz would be aired on television. I clearly remember the Monday mornings following the special viewings. No teacher would dare to teach a normal lesson without first allowing discussion time for the movie. I don't know if that happened in other schools across the country or only the ones in my state. We were special. Like Dorothy, Kansas was our home.

But unlike most of my classmates, Kansas had not been my family's home for generations. My maternal grandparents had been born in Europe and slowly made their way to Leavenworth, Kansas. My father had fled Nazi Germany in 1937 and came to Wichita where he met my mother.

Also, unlike my classmates, I did not see my future in Kansas. Before I even understood what college was my mother had already begun indoctrinating me to go to an out-of-state university. She knew my chances of getting married in college were great and there were very few Jewish students in the Kansas universities.

So at the age of almost 18, I left home and went over the rainbow -- all the way to Arizona, without even a dog to keep me company.

I was homesick in the beginning. After a short time, though, as my mother had envisioned, I met the man who would become my husband. Together we began learning more about our Jewish heritage. We both started keeping kosher and Shabbat. When we were married we decided to make our home in Phoenix and joined the small Orthodox community there. We lived there for 12 years and then we decided to make aliyah.

I will never forget that day in 1986 at the Wichita Airport. Kissing my parents good-bye was one of the hardest things I had ever done. I felt like Dorothy saying farewell to the lion, tin-man, and scarecrow. Yes, I was going home to the land of Israel, but I was leaving behind my parents. My parents! Our relationship could not even compare to the friendships Dorothy had with her friends in the Land of Oz.

There were many adjustments to make to our new life in Israel. As time went on, our Hebrew improved, we began liking new foods, and we found the community of Shilo in which to make our home. Everything seemed to get easier each year except for one thing, which was no small matter: our parents. It became harder and harder for them to travel.

My husband and I would take turns visiting them, usually with one child in tow. Every time my visit ended I would remember that scene from the Wichita airport in 1986. Only now Dorothy's words, said right before she clicked her heels together three times to go home, would run through my head. "Oh, it's going to be so hard to say goodbye. I love you all, too."

I learned through the years to control my tears as I said good-bye to my parents. Each time I boarded the plane I felt a mixture of guilt for leaving them and longing for my home. I would wish that I could just click my heels together and be there. Each time after I landed at Ben Gurion, more of Dorothy's words would run through my mind. "Toto, we're home, home and this is my room and you're all here and I'm never leaving here ever, ever again because I love you all."

How I wished I would never have to leave ever, ever again. My mother died in 2000 and I missed not being able to visit her. I tried to talk my father into joining us in Israel. He was afraid to make such a major change and stayed alone in his house until 2007 when the doctor told him he had only a couple months to live.

We brought my father to Shilo to live with us. After 20 years of seeing his daughter and grandchildren only sporadically my father was seeing us daily. Perhaps it was all the love he received here that proved the doctor wrong. Instead of a couple of months my father had 11 very special months with us.

My father was buried in the Shilo cemetery in a funeral well attended by friends, neighbors, rabbis, and his family, and I was faced with a problem once I finished sitting shiva. My mother and father had been a most devoted couple. They belonged together side by side for eternity. So I began the process of bringing my mother here for reburial.

It was not easy -- the process would be complicated and expensive. It was my uncle who urged me to go through with the plan.

Eight years and one day after my mother died she was reburied next to my father in the Land of Israel. Some Jews have the privilege of living here. Others have the honor of being buried here. There are those who will only come at the end of days with the resurrection of the dead.

It would have been nice if I could have had generations of family in Israel as my non-Jewish playmates had in Kansas. For centuries that was not a reality for Jews. But now it is. We can all come home. Like Dorothy said at the end of the film, "There's no place like home."

Author Biography:
Ester Katz Silvers has made her home in Shilo for 21 years. Recently her first novel, Sondra's Search, was published. Her grandson, Elkana Yedidya Ben Dvora Leah, has several more surgeries ahead of him and the doctors say he has a good prognosis.

This article can also be read at: http://www.aish.com/jewishissues/israeldiary/Not_In_Kansas_Anymore.asp

Let Go of the Mouse (by Sara Yoheved Rigler)

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 19:14:29 GMT

Let Go of the Mouse
by Sara Yoheved Rigler

by Sara Yoheved Rigler

An antidote for control freaks.

Obeying Microsoft's recommendations can lead to catastrophe. That's what happened to me when I innocently clicked on "Yes" in the window that recommended condensing my emails in order to save space on my hard disk. Some 20 minutes later, the job was done -- and my last month and a half of emails had disappeared.

"Don't panic," I told myself. "They must be in there somewhere." But as the specter of dozens of red-flagged emails that direly needed replies began to haunt me, I became increasingly agitated. A frantic 45 seconds later, I called Microsoft Israel's technical support.

Yaniv was reassuring. "Don't worry," he calmed me. "They're in the Recycle Bin on your desktop." Lo and behold, they were! But how to get them back into my Outlook Express?

"Well, it's a little complicated," Yaniv said. "I don't think you'll be able to do it on your own. Are you willing to share control of your computer with me until we solve the problem?"

A person drowning in cyberspace will agree to anything. "Yes, Yes!" I promised.

The first thing he had me do was download the program, "Microsoft Easy Assist." Then a window appeared asking if I was willing to share control of my computer with a Microsoft technical support assistant. "Yes," I clicked emphatically.

A small blue box appeared in the lower right hand corner of my screen. It asked the same question again. Apparently relinquishing control is not so easy for some people. "It's okay, Yaniv," I told him on the phone. "I trust you." I clicked, "Yes," and the little blue box switched messages. Now it assured me that at any time I wanted to withdraw control from the technical support assistant, all I had to do was click the appropriate box. "Why would I want to do that?" I wondered. "He's helping me do what I could never do by myself. I guess some people really have control issues."

"Okay, are you ready?" Yaniv asked.

"Yes."

"Now let go of the mouse."

"Excuse me?"

"Let go of the mouse. I'm going to control your mouse."

Let go of my mouse? I sat there with my hand frozen on my trusty mouse.

"If you want me to restore your emails," Yaniv explained patiently, "You have to let me control your mouse."

I let go.

Then, like some preternatural Ouija board, my pointer started to move by itself. With my hands tightly folded on my lap and my eyes wide, I saw the pointer moving rapidly and clicking. Every move was accompanied by Yaniv's first-person plural declarations, "Now, we'll click here. Now we'll open up this window. Now we'll right click on this." It was a royal "we." I was doing nothing. He was doing everything.

Ten minutes later the phantom emails were sitting pertly back in my Outlook Express. Yaniv told me to click on the little blue box withdrawing permission for him to control my computer. I did so reluctantly. Obviously, he knew how to run my computer better than I did.

LET GO AND LET GOD

While some of us are worse control freaks than others, all of us resist relinquishing control of our lives to God. We human beings have been in competition with the Almighty ever since Adam and Eve were seduced into eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge by the enticement: "You will become like gods."

What's wrong with wanting to control your own life rather than letting God be God?

First of all, thinking that you are in ultimate control of everything that happens to you, which is the same as thinking that you are God, is crazier than thinking that you're Napoleon. This delusion bumps up against reality every time that you get stuck in an unexpected traffic jam, or your flight is delayed three hours (causing you to miss your connection), or you get sick on a day when you simply can't afford to miss work.

The best damage control is to realize that you are not in control, like the sign that hung in my bedroom three decades ago: "LET GO AND LET GOD." If you don't surrender control, you will still be sitting on the runway as the hours tick by, but your blood pressure will be catapulting to dangerous levels and you may find yourself shouting at the stewardess or making vain threats never to fly that airline again, even though it's the only one that flies to Xanpliwey.

The day after my Microsoft lesson in letting go, I found myself in an unpalatable position. I had agreed to deliver a welcome basket to an important family arriving in Israel to study Judaism. My assignment was to take a taxi to the neighborhood where they would be staying and to visit with them for fifteen minutes to make them feel comfortable. They were due to arrive on a Friday afternoon. On Thursday I carefully shopped for the perfect assortment of fruit, salads, sushi, chocolates, plus junk food for the children. Then I found the ideal basket. With meticulous care, I arranged each item in the basket.

On Friday at noon, I started phoning the two cell numbers I had been given. They were not turned on. With mounting dismay, as the onset of Shabbat drew nearer and nearer, I kept dialing the numbers, to no avail. My teenage son suggested that I just go and drop off the basket, whether or not they were there, but I responded that the whole point was for me to visit with them. My daughter suggested that maybe they had arrived early in the morning and had turned off their cell phones because they were now sleeping, so I should just go and ring their doorbell. That would be even worse, I pointed out. I'm supposed to make a favorable impression and instead I should annoy them by waking them up?

At 4 o'clock their phones were still turned off. Finally, in desperation, I called a taxi and went. As I sat in the cab in a state of heightened anxiety -- What if they're not there? What if I wake them up? -- I suddenly heard Yaniv's voice: "Let go of the mouse."

With a jolt I realized: I had done everything I could do, and now I was no longer in control. God runs the world. It will be the way He wants it. I let go of the mouse, and relaxed.

When I got to the address, I found the landlord watering the garden. I asked for the family who was supposed to be staying upstairs. He informed me that their flight had been rerouted, and they would be arriving in Jerusalem only minutes before Shabbat. He let me into the apartment to drop off my basket and refrigerate the sushi and salads. I left my card with a message of greeting, resolving to call them after Shabbat. And that was that. It didn't work out the way I had planned; it worked out the way God had planned. And who knows which scenario was ultimately better? By letting go of the mouse, I returned home relaxed and content, instead of frustrated and vexed.

THE BETTER CONTROLLER

The second reason to let God be God is that He does a better job of it than we would. Just as relinquishing control of the mouse to Yaniv had yielded a better result than my trying to solve the problem, sometimes we are afforded a glimpse of how God is more qualified than we are to run the world.

Jerusalem resident Hedy Kleiman was visiting her father in Toronto for two weeks. Her father had been chronically ill with kidney disease for eight years. With both of his children living in Israel, he had been well taken care of by his wife. Since her mother's death nine months before, however, Hedy had flown to Toronto twice to help her father. This time she found him weaker than before, but stable.

On Tuesday night she was scheduled to fly home to Israel. At noon on Tuesday the phone rang. It was El Al calling for Hedy. "How did you get my number in Toronto?" Hedy asked, perplexed. The El Al clerk said she had called Hedy's number in Jerusalem, and her son had supplied the Toronto number. El Al was calling to ask Hedy to agree to be bumped from her flight that night. In exchange, El Al would give her a reservation for Thursday night plus a free ticket Tel Aviv-Toronto.

Hedy was nonplussed. She had five children at home to take care of, as well as a job that had already given her more than her share of vacation time. On the other hand, she thought, a free ticket would enable her to return to Toronto for her mother's yahrzeit in April. And why, she wondered uneasily, had El Al selected her, out of hundreds of passengers, to be bumped?

"First of all," responded Hedy, "I can't fly Thursday night. The plane would land on Friday too close to Shabbat. What about Saturday night?"

"Saturday night is solidly booked. The best we can do is give you a reservation for Sunday night."

"I can't decide without speaking to my husband and my boss at work," Heddy waffled, "I'll call you back."

"No, we'll call you back," the El Al clerk insisted. "How many minutes do you need?"

"Ten," Hedy answered. She couldn't reach her husband (who told her later that he would have advised against it), but her boss okayed the extra days. When the El Al clerk called back with uncharacteristic promptness, Hedy agreed to be bumped and fly on Sunday night instead.

Late Saturday night, Hedy's father suddenly felt sick and asked her to call an ambulance. By Sunday morning, he had lost consciousness. Hedy recited "Shema Yisrael" and the traditional "Vidui" [confession] for him. At 11:30 Sunday morning, he died. Thanks to her celestial travel agent, his beloved daughter was at his side.

Sara Yoheved Rigler will be giving lectures and workshops in America in November. If you are interested in bringing her to your community, please write to her tour coordinator Belinda Levy at amblevy@yahoo.com

Author Biography:

Sara Yoheved Rigler is the author of the bestseller Holy Woman and of the new Lights from Jerusalem. She is a graduate of Brandeis University. After fifteen years of practicing and teaching meditation and Eastern philosophy, she discovered "the world''s most hidden religion: Torah Judaism." Since 1985, she has been practicing the spiritual path of Torah. She is a popular international lecturer on subjects of Jewish spirituality and also presents a highly-acclaimed workshop for women, "Dressing the Soul." She resides in the Old City of Jerusalem with her husband and children.

Her articles have appeared in: Jewish Women Speak about Jewish Matters, Chicken Soup for the Jewish Soul, and Heaven on Earth.

Click here to order Sara Yoheved Rigler''s brand new book, Lights from Jerusalem. Like Holy Woman, the stories in this volume both fascinate and inspire. Sara''s writings plumb the depths of human nature and aim toward the heights of spiritual aspiration. In the more than 50 selections in this book, culled primarily from Aish.com, Sara Yoheved Rigler shares with the reader her ever-fresh wonder and love for the transformative power of Judaism.

This article can also be read at: http://www.aish.com/spirituality/odysseys/Let_Go_of_the_Mouse.asp

Avraham's One Village - JEWISH & benei Noach's ONE VILLAGE ***Barukh haba***: Aish

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Aish.com New Blogs & Videos - August 19, 2008

The Counterfeiters (by Estee Reider and Rachel Ginsberg)

Aish.com New Articles - August 17, 2008‏

The Jewish Ethicist - Discounts (by Rabbi Dr Asher Meir)

Way #27 Happiness (by Rabbi Noah Weinberg)

Not In Kansas Anymore (by Ester (Ellen) Katz Silvers)

Let Go of the Mouse (by Sara Yoheved Rigler)

Avraham's One Village - JEWISH & benei Noach's ONE VILLAGE Barukh haba: Aish