Emuna Beams

Gog and Magog: Postwar Fallout

Are Gog and Magog really dead? Will there be a nuclear war? What about Moshiach, where does he fit in to the current-events news puzzle? What does the Noahide movement have to do with all of this?  Today's podcast looks at what's happening all around us through eyes of emuna and puts contemporary affairs in their proper spiritual perspective.

The Self-Healing Prayer

I was lecturing at an IAF base, and my host - the assistant base commander - showed me where the bathroom was. When I came out, I washed my hands three times consecutively with a cup and said slowly and with intent the Asher Yatzar blessing that one says after visiting the toilet. My host looked at me wide-eyed, as if I'd suddenly sprouted peacock feathers. "Rabbi," he gasped, "you guys even make a blessing after relieving yourselves?"
We sure do! It's the best and cheapest health insurance policy anywhere. Hear this:
For your reference, The Asher Yatzar blessing and the practical Halachas of visiting the bathroom are posted here.
 

Diamonds and Difficulties

Who of us doesn't have difficulties or major troubles in life? We all do – that's part of the turf in this world. But today, G-d willing, we're going to look at our difficulties from a different angle. When we do, we'll see something precious that we never saw before. With Hashem's help, we're about to turn our difficulties into priceless diamonds...
Click here for the written text of the "Prayer for Turning Difficulties into Diamonds". 

SCS: Spiritual Cataract Surgery

For everything in the physical word, there is an equivalent in the spiritual world. In fact, the spiritual equivalent is the source and spiritual root of that object in the physical world. For example, the same way that the light of the sun acts in photosynthesis to sustain a plant, Divine light acts upon a soul to sustain it in a strikingly similar manner. Just as we have cataract operations to correct cloudy vision in this world, there is SCS, "Spiritual Cataract Surgery" to better the soul's vision. If a person is unhappy in any way, he or she should strongly consider the option of SCS. Learn all about it in today's eye-opening and eye-healing podcast.

Bullseye

A person can score a bullseye in one of two ways. Either he or she can invest years of effort and training to become a champion archer, or he or she can be a slouch, grab a bow, shoot an arrow in the general direction of the target, and then draw the bullseye around wherever his or her arrow lands...

Above the Stars

In 1982, a squad of 12 Israeli paratroopers organized a midnight séance. They ushered in the soul of their sergeant’s grandfather. The soul said, "Tomorrow, you guys will be joining me…"
Is astrology the real deal? What about seances? Are we allowed to consult astrologers and clairvoyants, and depend on what they say? Today's podcast is a concise guide to the perplexed.

Muddy Road

Does your life sometimes feel like a muddy road, full of potholes and obstacles that everyone and everything has trampled on? Just when there's no hope...

Control Freak

Today's podcast comes from the "Ad Halom" Israel Independence War Monument Park in Ashdod. "Ad Halom" in Hebrew means, "until here", to commemorate the most northern point in Israel that the Egyptian Army reached in 1948. Had, they captured Ashdod, there would have been nothing to stop the Egyptians from capturing the entire south of Israel as far as Tel Aviv - Jaffa in the north. But even in Ashdod there was nothing to stop the entire Egyptian Army except for a single-engine Piper piloted by a South African Jew named Eddie Cohen, of sacred and martyred memory, who was dropping Molotov cocktails from the cockpit on the heads of the Egyptians. Any objective observer knows that Hashem was controlling events, not the fledgling army. It's still the same, so there's no sense in trying to be a control freak...

The Shoemaker

A shoemaker and his customer get into an argument about torn soles and torn souls in today's parable for strengthening emuna.

3 Simple Steps to Success

For many of us, our goals seem like dreams that are impossible to reach. We want them to materialize, but we think they never will. If you think you can't, today you'll learn 3 time-tested tips of how you can and will succeed in whatever you want to accomplish - spiritual, material or both.

A Signed Check from King David

Today's podcast takes us on a 3400-year tour back in history to Ashdod's ancient port citadel. From the scenic backdrop of ancient stones and the blue Mediterranean, we learn how the Book of Psalms resembles the history of the Land of Israel - the digger you deep the more you uncover. We also learn how three significant words invoke a good livelihood and one lone word invokes miraculous salvation, all signed checks from King David.
 

The Key to Successful Relationships

In today's video podcast, Rabbi Lazer tells a moving story from the Gemara in Tractate Taanis about Rebbe Yehoshua's encounter in Rome with Caesar and his daughter. When Caesar's daughter saw the renown Jewish sage from the Land of Israel, she asked,  "How can such magnificent wisdom be housed in such an ugly vessel?" In explaining this passage of Gemara, its Kabbalistic ramifications and the practical advice each one of us can glean from it, we learn the key to successful relationships. Today's lesson will not only help us choose friends and the right soulmate, but it explains the proper balance and relationship between body and soul.