Jewish Life Digital Edition October 2015 | Page 39

WISDOM

TEXT: COMPILED BY LIZ SAMUELS

Which man desires life, who loves
days of seeking good? Guard your
tongue from evil, and your lips
from speaking deceit. Turn from
evil and do good, seek peace and
pursue it. Tehillim 34:13 - 15
What was Rabbi Akiva’s beginning? By age forty, he had still not
studied Torah. Then one day, as he
stood by the mouth of a well, he
asked, “Who hollowed out this stone?”
They told him, “The water which falls steadily upon
the stone day after day.”
Rabbi Akiva immediately reflected, “If water can
hollow out solid rock, then surely the Torah, whose
words are as strong as iron, can make an impression
on my heart of flesh and blood!” He set out at once to
study Torah. Avos D’R’ Nosson 6
Everything that I created – I created for you. Take care
not to ruin and destroy My world, for if you ruin it,
there is no one to fix it after you.
Midrash Koheles Rabbah 7

A little bit of light dispels a lot of darkness.
Rabbainu Bachye
Man is measured by the same yardstick he uses to
measure others.
Bereishis Rabbah 9
A person is led on the path he wishes to travel.
Makkos 10b
Just like water gives life to th e world, so too Torah
gives life to the world.
Shir HaShirim Rabbbah 1
Let us search and examine our ways and return to
Hashem. Eichah 3:40
For the first time in history, the ideology of the world
is that there is no ideology. For the first time in Jewish
history, the consciousness of a generation of Jews
does not include Judaism. Man has lost his inner
grasp of himself as man; Jews have lost their inner
grasp of themselves as Jews.
Rabbi Akiva Tatz JL