wss ..... .. . • $:**3:4•*. "XSV"0 Torah Portion It's What We Do With What We Have B C !!! • 1 111 POPULAR DEMAND SALE! MOTHER'S DAY "SPECIAL" For 2 Days Only Friday - Saturday May 7th and May 8th Exclusively at: 6720 Orchard Lake Road W. Bloomfield (next to Deli Unique) 248-855-6566 • All merchandise fully guaranteed with full appraisal certificates for insurance purposes!! ............. *Mt UNDER ONE ROOF China & Gifts l ■ IIMMI MINI NMI OEM MINIM MINI SIM MID • 2,000 rute, egitta, ettitat tetuvomte, cua eitvetAva,te pattetuo - tie otoek fa ut- Conversations tie 6 1.681. • atat,oltee tie gtae-to-ie to Melo o re-;" ma, ai P &at r • ACCENTS , IN NEEDLEPOINT Contemporary Designs 626-3042 aLegcrA caraie Wm, 93fooutfiet3 (OtegcLO £crte, 15 Wife) 5/7 1999 (248) 737 -8080 om• knowledge in whatever you are doing to be lucky. In other words, luck does not just happen. In most cases it is based around skill. To some commentators, these verses teach us that how we deal with the things that happen to us will determine our real success and failure. In other words, what we do when success or fail- ure, health and happiness meet us on t first glance, this Torah por- the road of life is what will determine tion sounds like a divine ver- our real spiritual "centeredness" and of sion of the cause and effect well being or being off balance. relationship. If we only do There is a belief that each com- what God demands of us, good things mandment and every mitzvah is based will happen. If we don't do what we are around training ourselves to told, we'll be sorry. If taken to be good to people under any its natural conclusion, it could circumstance. No one should be the meaning behind all be glib about suffering. A reward and punishment in life. very wise teacher once taught It would also mean that that whenever you are hurt behind everything bad that or you fail or have a sickness, happens to us, we must have you should say "gam zu rtova done something wrong. — this, too, is for the best." Using that logic, when an But there is a gam zu ground accident occurs, it must be because some mezuza parch- RABBI DANNEL rule. The ground rule is this: You can only say gam zu ment is no longer intact or we SCHWARTZ about your own tzouris and are being punished for some Special to the not someone else's suffering. past error in religious judge- Jewish News So when someone else falls ill ment. When death darkens or fails we cannot say it was our doorstep, we must have beshert or karma, that it was for the done something terribly wrong; and best. It is too easy to dismiss another's when our year goes well, we must have suffering by saying, "Oh, you'll learn done everything right. I believe to say from it; it will help you; it was meant this would be cruel. And Judaism is any- to be!" thing but cruel. On the contrary, it is our job to help The rabbinic commentators over the the sufferer to relieve his pain, not to sit centuries have had a great deal to say in judgement and speculate that all suf- about suffering and wellness, failure and fering is purposeful. When we hurt our- success and the reasons why some pros- selves, when we ourselves have pain or per while others fall short. To some, suffer, we are told that it does us no these verses had nothing to do with why good to say "ah, poor me." Instead, we suffer. To them, illness and health that's when the gam zu la tova rule were natural occurrences. To them, the should go into effect. We should use the divine presence was not a simplistic suffering and the pain somehow in the Santa Claus who rewards the nice and spiritual side of who we are and what we punishes the naughty. Success might will be to create a better result from any have more to do with being in the right and every situation. place at the right time or the skill we Every trial and every joy are all part bring to all situations. of gam zu la tova on a personal level. If There is a wonderful midrash that we can live that way in our hearts, in says the word mazal, meaning "luck,"is our souls and in our minds, than this, really an acrostic. Each letter of the word too, will be good. ❑ signifies another word: mem is for makom, which means place — that all luck is based on the skill of knowing and being in the right place. The zion is for z3nan, which means time — that you have to learn how to have the right Can you cite examples of bad timing for all that you do in order for things that have happened when luck to bless your efforts. And last but we have not done any wrong? not least, the letter lamed is for limud, How did "spiritual centeredness" which means learning — you have to affect those in the Holocaust? In study diligently in order to have enough what ways can pain and suffering Shabbat Behar Bechukotai: Leviticus 25:1-27.•4; Jeremiah 16:19-17•14. Dannel Schwartz is rabbi of Temple Shir Shalom. IN THE ORCHARD MALL WEST BLOOMFIELD help us to be better people? • ".%,..yst,..