Two and a half months and still not used to the water

Thank G-d that's the only thing I haven't gotten used to. Well, maybe the whole white shirt, black pants routine looks a little mundane, but who am I to judge fashion?

This past week went by quickly. The school is still on break so I spent a lot of time in the beis (pronounced bayes) studying. I've taken a liking to the Musar (pronounced Moos-ur) movement. You can wikipedia it, but basically it was a movement that began right before the reform movement in Germany that intended to revive an awe of G-d and development of the self through the use of psychology. So yea, pretty cool stuff. There's one auther called the Ramchal that never wasted a word. Every sentence packs tremendous meaning, it's like nothing I've ever read!! If you're interested, look up "Path of the Just" or "The Way of G-d". Truly amazing things that will tax your brain.

Also, last weeks parsha, section of the Torah dealt with two important messages. The first one involves Aaron's sons being killed by G-d for lighting a "strange fire" upon the altar. While they were correct halachically (halacha or halakah is the Jewish Law) correct, the reason they died was because they did not ask their teacher Moses or their father, Aaron, what to do. This message comes to me at a time when I'm beginning to really learn all this Jewish stuff and able to formulate my own opinions and arguments. This parsha, however, reminds me that no matter how much I know, I must show respect for my teachers and elders in addition to beware of arrogance.

Secondly, the parsha mentioned that we never truly run from our sins. When Aaron approached the alter to begin his duties, he saw the golden calf (the altar formed the appearence of a cow because it had "horns") and recoilled back. Moses had to snap him out of it and said, "Aaron, it's time to do your duties and move past your sins but don't forget." I read today that "Woe to the man who forgets his sins" because he/she will never learn or inevitable make the same mistakes.

Now, I've always been the "I never regret anything" kind-of-guy, but this says otherwise. Regret is indeed important if you did something without thinking or that was foolish. Could be a person you shouldn't have hooked up with "just because you were drunk" or buying that lame-ass Smashmouth album back in the day. Referencing more to my relationship with other people, I did some stupid things like people do. But where I'm changing as a person, is that I don't want to hurt people ever again. Whatever I did to people, I strongly regret hurting them. I publicly apologize to all those I hurt through my actions and ask for their forgiveness as I was always and will always be held accountable for my actions.

But like Moses said, time to move on. I don't want to "live" in my regret, but learn from it to make myself better.

We'll see what this week has to offer and I hope that everyone has a fantastic week. This is Zack signing out from Jerusalem

Peace