If there was one way to characterize Shami (Shlomtzion) Reinman, who passed away last month at age 64, it’s that she was adored by everyone she came in contact with. For Shami, it was a thrill to dress up in a funny costume, to sing and make jokes, to create joy. That love of laughter and simchah defined her, from the time she was a young child to the pain-racked days at the end of her life.
“When he learned that Rav Lopiansky, then a maggid shiur in Mir Yerushalayim, was willing to consider the position, he made him an offer he couldn’t refuse.”
Soon after Rav Boruch Ber Leibowitz was buried in 1939, the Jewish community of Vilna was destroyed and his unmarked grave forgotten. But then, 70 years later, a little girl’s sudden deformity led to a series of seemingly unrelated events that resulted in the discovery of his resting place. This week, on the Torah giant’s 75th yahrtzeit, the Torah world will gather to honor his memory
When Charlie Press enlisted in the US Army in 1945, he became an unwitting witness to the horrors of history in the waning days of World War II. But it took nearly 50 years until he was ready to talk about it.
A blind, penniless Holocaust survivor stumbles into England at the end of the war, half his family gone and his prospects nil. But what begins as a tragedy ends in triumph. Hershel Herskovic decided he’d continue living.
“I’m the lawyer, the agent, serving as an advocate between you and your Father in Heaven,” Rav Dovid Chaim Stern tells those who seek his counsel. The work he demands isn’t easy, but Rav Stern, the mekubal of Bnei Brak, is ready to pour out his tefillos and bestow his brachos in exchange for spiritual “deals” he makes with his chassidim around the world.
