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Moon Valley Rustic Furniture Excluded der CASUAL FURNISHINGS 6465 Dixie Hwy., Clarkston • 625-3322 • Mon.-Fri. 9:30-5:30 • Tues. 9:30-8:00 Sat. 9:30-4:30 • Sun. 1-4 SHALOM - WELCOME Join the warm family atmosphere at Congregation B 'nai David 5642 West Maple Road, West Bloomfield IN TIME FOR THE HIGH HOLY DAYS We are committed to Traditional Judaism relevant to contemporary American suburban life. • Family memberships are currently available • Special affordable rates for couples & singles under 35 • Special consideration for senior citizens HAVE YOUR FAMILY JOIN OUR EXTENDED SYNAGOGUE FAMILY TODAY! (JD UJ Services conducted by Rabbi Milton Arm The liturgy will be chanted by Cantor Barry Ulrych Cr) U.J CALL 855-5007 For further information CC U.J LU 32 in our Classified Section Find Life's Blessings, Learn To Love Life Shabbat Re'e: Deuteronomy11:26-16:17; Isaiah 54:11-55:5. A long time ago, I believed quicksand of our powerlessness. that the words of this won- Emotional pain is as debilitat- derful Torah portion are all ing as its physical counterpart. It about the Jewish concept is the centrifugal force that drags of free choice. After all, when it us into a realm that seems to have says, "I set before you this day a no escape. It is easy to be con- blessing and a curse ..." isn't God sumed by it, and to wallow in all letting us choose between two dis- of the loneliness and the rage that tinct regions of life? are its natural counter- Yet, the older I get, the parts. more I wonder which When pain happens, events are blessings and we tend to see everything which are the real curses. through its filter. In the Some happenstances that prism of hurt, we are were, at first blush, filled shaped by the events with light, suddenly rather than vice versa. turned very dark and We become affected, troubled; and I have per- rather than effective. sonally witnessed the ag- When faced with cata- RABBI onizingly painful losses strophe, sickness or DARNEL I. from which a thousand death, even the strongest SCHWARTZ blessings flowed. and most talented indi- Perhaps you can find SPECIAL viduals fall apart and one of the better inter- TO THE suddenly develop the per- pretations in an antholo- sona of the victim. JEWISH NEWS The Tcrah portion is gy called the Itturei Torah, which speaks in the name telling us that it doesn't have to of the Vayedaber Moshe. In it, the be that way. The choice is not in author tells us that you cannot what happens to us, but in how choose what is going to happen to we react. you. You cannot pick the blessing To the mystic, all wisdom or the curse, life or death; all you comes with the realization that it can do is choose how you are go- is infantile to believe that we have ing to react to it all. If you are control over everything in our blessed with wealth, for example, world; we don't! Our blessing and and you forget God, suddenly the our ability to cope lie in the un- midas touch takes over. Posses- derstanding that the only power sion becomes more important we possess is our ability to control than people, and instability pre- our reactions to the circumstances vents any possibility of joy, which that we are faced with — good, bad or indifferent. When we know turns blessing into curse. On the other side of the coin, this one fact, we possess the pow- if you amass wealth, and use it for er to stop the pain. the sake of God and humankind, The real blessing the Torah is and it helps you to deepen your offering is that, when faced with spiritual life and your chance to the worst situations in life, we try make your world a better place, to find the kindest and nicest way then it will be a blessing. of dealing with both the problem Most of us are concerned about and the people around us. the curses and seeming catastro- A woman lost her child to a phes that happen. When disease drunk driving accident and, in- or death cuts a hole through our stead of cursing the world, she be- lives, a 19th century Yiddish gan an organization called proverb sums up our reaction: 'To Mothers Against Drunk Driving. a worm in horseradish, the whole A man stricken with cancer world is horseradish." Interpre- suddenly realized that cursing the tation: To those in pain, the whole doctors did not make him any world is filled only with painful healthier, and being angry at things. everyone who came to see him just When disaster strikes, we re- cost him the few visitors he was alize that we are not inviolate, and receiving. His wife told me that that can be a scary and debilitat- the hardest thing for him to do ing thought. The trick to making was to consciously be nice to peo- life a blessing is getting our minds ple, and not lash out at them for out of the horseradish long enough being healthier than he was. The to create positive alternatives to cancer that the doctors believed our pain. If we don't find options, would kill him in a matter of c-7/ we will be constantly stuck in the months has totally disappeared from his body for the past six years. The doctors have said that Dannel I. Schwartz is the it is not even in remission — the spiritual leader of Temple Shir cancer is gone. Miracles happen. Shalom.