Steven Stein

2008-09-09T07:53:00.001-07:00

Tim Sanders preview reel from Tim Sanders on Vimeo.

Tehillim 104:20

2008-08-15T00:25:00.001-07:00

When you wake up tomorrow morning, consider what was happening while you were sleeping:

From Psalm 114:20-114:24

20. You make darkness and it is night, in which every beast of the forest moves about.
You make darkness and it is night Every day You darken and block out the sun and it becomes night, when all the beasts of the forest move about.

21. The young lions roar for prey and to beg their food from God.

22. When the sun rises they gather in and couch in their dens.
When the sun rises they gather in into the secret places and hide there from the sons of men; then every man goes forth to his work.

23. Man goes out to his work, to his labor until evening.

24. How great are Your works, O Lord! You have made them all with wisdom; the earth is full of Your possessions!
Your possessions Heb. קנינך, the acquisition that you have acquired, like (Gen. 14:19): “Owner (קנה) of heaven and earth.” All is acquired by You.

This is a great thing to think about before going off to work in the morning!

A Word About Chevra Kadisha

2005-01-17T08:26:00.000-08:00

In Honor of Dr. Schild zt"l, a pillar of our community in Rhawnhurst Philadelphia, Rabbi Shmuel Kaminetsky shlit"a, Rosh Yeshiva of Tamudic Academy of Philadelphia, gave a class on Chevra Kadisha.
Some of the thoughts are that G-d creates the body to house the holy soul, and the body is a holy vessel for that soul. We treat the dead body with the utmost respect. We do not burn it, or harvest its organs.
We have a chevra kadisha which performs a ritual preparation for burial. It is a mistake not to talk about this when someone performs this ritual commandment. A person who is part of the chevra kadisha should say, "I just performed the ritual preparation according to Jewish law on such-and-such a person (who passed away)." Rabbi Kaminetsky told of a story where confusion occured because things were kept hush-hush, in a different type of situation, when a woman got divorced according to Jewish Law but it was kept hush-hush. When later she tried to get remarried, rumors were that no one had ever heard she was divorced, so how could she remarry. The same is with a dead person, it should be publicized that they were prepared for burial according to the Jewish Law.
Chevra kadisha is done by women for women, and by men for men. Unmarried persons should not be recruited to join, but if someone who is unmarried is asking to join because they want to participate, the case can be considered individually and it is possible he/she can be allowed to join.
The utmost consideration is the wants of the dead person, not of the family. For instance, if the family wants to break Jewish Custom this is considered contrary to the dead person's wishes, and Jewish Custom should be followed. Two customs are the most important. One, that the body be treated according to the Jewish Law, and the other that the coffin is not re-opened. In that sense, there is no reason for any problems to occur. One example would be that the family wants the body dressed in a different outfit than the traditional shroud. In such a case, the family's concerns should be considered as well (secondarily), since they are in a terrible state of sadness, so it is not necessary to argue with them, just let them believe what they want about how the outfit was used in the process and do not return the outfit to them. But at the same time do not deviate from the custom of using the shroud.
Sometimes there is blood and it is impossible to do the ritual without exacerbating the wounds. In such a case not exacerbating the wounds takes precedence over the ritual. For example, if the ritual is to pour water over the body, but this will exacerbate a wound, then the ritual does not take precedence. The ritual is not performed because it would cause the wound to get worse.
The Talmud refers to burying the dead as "True Kindness" because there is no possibility of the dead person thanking the burial society members.

Thanks to Mendel Simpson for relating these thoughts to me from the class. Also thanks to Dr. Mandelbaum for arranging the class, as well as his extensive work running the Chevra Kadisha.

Another day

2005-01-06T15:46:00.000-08:00

Another Day

Today another day came and went. My father and I didn't talk, because he went to Florida. SO stay tuned and maybe tomorrow I will have an update. It didn't hurt either that I worked until after midnight.

Day After

2005-01-05T11:55:00.000-08:00

It's all about this
There isn't a better time to do this than now. It's the day after. No one knows what happened yesterday.
Yesterday I began an amazing journey. This journey will be documented here in this blog. It all started with a phone call from my father. He is an amazing man, one whose life has been dedicated to some of the most significant causes of our time, mostly regarding human rights. Today he is in his old age, and we have begun discussing the important matters of the world, such as how it was created, what man is doing on it, and what is the best way to go in today's world situation.
Hopefully this blog will adequately record these fascinating interactions for the reader.