I dont think lashon hara was chosen or sinas chinam or other topics were chosen because someone decided something good to campaign about to work on. they were chosen because according to various opinions or commentaries, those topics are topics to work on and improve on so as to effect the geula or to effect the return fo the beis hamikdash because those failings are what caused the destruction....

Interestingly, you can now take a tour of the Beit Hamikdash using Google Maps..

According to a report in Yediot, Minister of Transportation Yisrael Katz has given instructions to advance plans to extend the high speed train route from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem to include a stop by the Old City of Jerusalem near the Kotel. The plan will include an underground station in the area that will be named "Tachanat HaKotel".

Katz explained that by building this route extension the load will be significantly lightened form the main station by Binyanei Hauma, and it will allow tourists, students, and all citizens in general to easily arrive at and visit the Kotel from the center of the country..

This is awesome. Not only will it make it easier to get through Jerusalem to the Kotel area, and not only will it perhaps encourage more people to go - people who don't want to go to Jerusalem thinking it is either unsafe or a difficult trip due to traffic and the amount of time it takes - to the Old City and the Kotel area, but one day, hopefully in the near future, it will also perhaps be used to bring the masses of "olei regel" to the Beis Hamikdash...

a bunch of years ago some kid in Rishon LeTzion threw a rock at a Haredi kid from a nearby school. The rock hit the kid and injured his eye.

The injured student has sued the Iryah of Rishon and the insurance company as a result of his injury.

Whatever happened in the court case happened, and the court ruled payment of damages of 70,000nis to the injured child.

The interesting part is in the decision, handed down during the 9 Days just over a week ago, the judge wrote that "we should be able to overcome the baseless hatred that consumes us, on the way to the building of the Third Beit Hamikdash, which should be soon speedily in our days"
source: Kikar

how many judges write such things in their court decisions?

interesting report.. especially how connected it is to Christian missionaries..

further to the crowdfunding campaign to finance the building of the Third Beit Hamikdash, the Temple Institute has now also released the plans for the chamber for the Sanhedrin.. pretty cool...

The Temple Institute presents for the first time, complete and highly detailed blueprints of the Sanhedrin Assembly Hall, the Chamber of Hewn Stone, part of the Holy Temple complex itself. These plans, drawn up by a top Israeli architectural firm hired by the Temple Institute, incorporate modern technological innovation while remaining true to the specific requirements of the Sanhedrin. These plans represent the first stage in the drawing up of comprehensive architectural plans for the entire Holy Temple complex.This video is based on these plans.

Strange story here - that led to a 100 million shekel lawsuit...

A fellow claims he tried to open a bank account for the funding of the construction of the Third Beit Hamikdash. He claims that God appeared to him in a dream and told him to build the Temple. When he tried to open a bank account to process donation for this project, the banks refused to open the account. Five different banks, they all refused. He went to the District Court in Beer Sheva, claiming he was refused for no good reason, and they too told him to jump in a lake. This fellow has now also appealed to the Supreme Court, only to be rejected by them as well.

His rejection by the courts was actually for peripheral reasons. he had not supplied the right, or enough, documentation proving his financial situation or how his finances were affected by the rejection.
source: NRG Law

Sounds interesting. I'd like to know on what basis the banks refused to open the account. Even if they thought he is a crackpot, why would they not want his money?

We pretty much have a rule that nowadays anybody who says God spoke to him is pretty much a crackpot. I wonder if or how we will ever believe the Mashiach or Elijah or any other modern-day prophet when that should come to be...

"You must stop Israel from Building the Beit Hamikdash"

  -- NRG

this is what the Palestinians are now imploring of the international community.

all I can say is halevai the Israelis (specifically the government) really wanted to and were actually planning to build the Beit Hamikdash, besides for a small number of them..

Today's FSotD goes to a Facebook page called "photos and news of Al Aqsa mosque". The page is entirely in Arabic.

The status says:

and was accompanied by the following picture - of what looks like the Beit Hamikdash being placed over the mosque:


It is for things like this that God created Google Translate.. the status reads, translated to English by GT:
Whats Vdj crashes suddenly the whole world.! ; 
What if we woke up one morning and found the maximum was demolished.! 

We found that the sons of Zion did not wreak the corruption which remains one stone.! . . ; 
Tamiloha well, the Zionists increasingly Tkalphm the Al-Aqsa Mosque

I still don't know what point they are trying to make... but the depiction is interesting..

hattip to David Ha'Ivri

When talking about the mitzva of building the Beit Hamikdash, who has not jokingly wondered what would be if we would succeed in building the Mikdash today, just as we do about the coming of Mashiach? I have joked, and have heard many other do so as well similarly.

If Mashiach were to come, would he be Sephardi, Ashkenazi? Hassidic? Gur, Belz or Vizshnitz, or something else? If he will be Sephardi, the Ashkenazim won't follow. If Ashkenaz, the Sephardim won't. If Hassidic, nobody else will, but also within hasidism, it depends which group he is from.
Then there is the Beit Hamikdash. What hechsher will the korbanot be? Will they be glatt? Beit Yosef? Eida? Rabbanut? Hassidic hechsher? Will the kohen gadol be.... yadda yadda yadda..

you get the point..

It is no longer just a layman's joke.. The Tolna Rebbe has now said why the only way for us to get the Beit Hamikdash will be for it to fall from Heaven complete and intact, instead of being built by humans.

If you can understand the Yiddish, listen to it yourself below. If you are like me and don't know Yiddish.. here is a transcript, courtesy of Bechadrei and VIN..

“My sons, Hakadosh Baruch Hu knows his yidden.  Imagine for yourselves that Moshiach is coming.  Let’s try to picture for ourselves that we are standing now on a Motzei Shabbos and we all hear the sound of the shofar. Moshiach is here.
“The first thing that we need to do is to rebuild the Bais Hamikdash.  We all know how the chareidi world operates, Baruch Hashem.  Picture for yourselves how this Bais Hamikdash will be built.  Let me tell you what is going to happen.
“The first ones who will enter the picture will be Agudas Yisroel who will say ‘Of course we are the ones who will build the Bais Hamikdash.  We are the ones who worry about all the needs of the chareidi community. Is there any doubt that we should be the ones in charge?’  They will convene a whole assembly of gedolim in order to decide what needs to be done.
“Meanwhile, R’ Meir Porush will come and say, ‘And what about me?  The Agudah represents everyone?  I want this to be under my auspices.’  And then there will be a second group of Rabbonim discussing how to build the Bais Hamikdash.
“The Litvaks will come next and they will start to scream. ‘Gevald! The chasidism should build the Bais Hamikdash?  They will all be dancing because they don’t know anything about the actual halachos of building the Bais Hamikdash.  They will offer to find one Kohein who actually knows the halachos of the avoda. But they will tell us:  “for this part, you are going to need the Kollel Chazon Ish.  For that part you are going to need the avreichim in Brisk.”  What are you, crazy?  We will build the Bais Hamikdash.’
“Then will come Satmar, from both sides, and they will say, ‘You are all Zionists!  You are unfit to build the Bais Hamikdash.’
“The Chabadniks will also get involved.  ‘You are all crazy!  Moshiach is ours!  It is our Rebbe, our Moshiach, what are you talking about the Bais Hamikdash?  You are all insane.’
“You understand that Moshiach will come and, nebuch, it will be another long galus just until we can all agree who will build the Bais Hamikdash.
Therefore, Hakadosh Baruch Hu has made the decision for us saying, ‘Listen to me, my children. It is enough for me that you will come to the Bais Hamikdash.  I will build it on my own, because there is no other way the Bais Hamikdash could ever be built.’”

This is just too strange and unexpected to pass by..

Rav Bentzion Hakohen Kook, a rav in the Romema neighborhood of Jerusalem and close student of Rav Elyashiv, has written a psak, that he says was shown to Rav Elyashiv, by which it would be prohibited to enter the Beit Hamikdash with long peyos.

Rav Kook explains that it is prohibited to enter the Temple with wild hair due to the laws of "mora mikdash", and serving with wild hair, and long peyos, is even worse resulting in a punishment of the Heavenly death penalty.

Rav Kook adds that he had discussed his psak with Rav Elyashiv, and Rav Elyashiv agreed with it while expressing his consternation at the idea. Rav Elyashiv had supposedly said that it is an amazing idea - the Kohanim were serving, the people were coming to bring their offerings and pay visits to the Mikdash, and all of the people would come on the holidays for aliyah l'regel, and it is a novelty to say that in the time of the Beis Hamikdash they could not grow their peyos long. Rav Elyashiv found a solution to the disturbing idea by saying that they could grow their peyos for a period of 30 days, so short peyos would be acceptable.

I am proud to say that I am machmir like this psak supposedly accepted by Rav Elyashiv and am preparing for the building of the Beis Hamikdash by keeping my peyos short and ready...

Another point Rav Kook makes is that the average Jew paying a visit to the Mikdash, say aliyah l'regel for example, would have been allowed to grow out a nice coiffed head of hair, with a blorit, or tchup in yeshivish, (forelock in English, I think), as a viisitors issue is adhering to concepts of mora mikdash, and a blorit is not "parua rosh". However, a kohen serving in the mikdash would not have been allowed to have a blorit.
(source: Walla)

True or not  I don't know, but definitely interesting...

And, as with all piskei halacha publicized via the Internet (or anywhere else for that matter), discuss it with your rav or research the issues yourself before relying on the psak.

Some fellow from Jerusalem, Rav Yonasan Shtencel, has taken the liberty to draft and send letters to both the Pope in the Vatican and another to the Vatican's ambassador to Israel asking/demanding that the Vatican return the vessels of the Beit Hamikdash to Jerusalem.

Shtencel is an educator, businessman, author and the grandson of someone famous, according to the page about him on WikiText. This page also includes these letters, which were just sent out this past week, making me wonder if it is just a stunt to boost his online profile.

Let's start with the letter to the ambassador, as it is shorter:


Loose translation:
Topic: the Pope's visit to the Holy Land and the return of the holy vessels

I am honored to turn to you about this issue:
1. The Pope Francisco is expected to soon visit Israel
2. As the representative of the Vatican and of the Pope in Israel, I place this letter in your handsso that you can be an honest messenger and partner in this historic goal... It is in your hands to bring this letter to his knowledge before his arrival so that the Pope will be able to weigh the issues and respond properly to the letter.
3. I am aware that it is almost definite that the Pope's mailbox is full of letters from believers, community members and many others. It is not for nothing that I turn to you personally so that this letter will not be received among the many letters as just another normal letter.
4. The content of this letter and its goal is far more important that many of the other letters he receives, without insulting anyone else.
5.  Relating to this letter properly will affect the future of the nations, the religions, peace and love based on the action requested, and it contains the ability of the Pope to leave his stamp on the future.
6. For all this I turn to you to direct my message to the Pope...


Letter to the Pope:



Loose translation:

Topic: Returning the holy vessels from the Jewish Temple to Israel on your upcoming visit to Israel

In the year 70 to the Christian count, Roman soldiers entered the Jewish Temple on Har Habayit in Jerusalem, part of the Judean kingdom in those days, and brought about the destruction of the Temple and took the vessels that served the Jewish people and the priests in their service of the one God in the Temple. As the one who has recently entered into this position and brings with him a new spirit and creativity, I turn to you with the following:
1. I am of the Jewish nation. I do not come as a messenger of anyone, but by the power of my faith with the desire and recognition to bring about through you an historic change  after many years of frozen relations and closed eyes from the historic truths.
2. I have learned about you in the short time.. you have been graced with, among your other qualities, a listening ear to other nationalities, and to people with their weaknesses and limitations.
3. As one who is familiar with the commandments of Christianity specifically and the history of the Jewish nation generally, including your knowledge of the Jewish religion, I believe the time is ripe on the even of your coming visit to Israel - the Holy Land - a visit that will be of historic proportions, should be taken advantage of by you to return the holy vessels, as everyone knows that they are found in the archives of the Vatican under your control.
4. Returning the holy vessels will give your role a special standing among the nations of the world and will give true meaning to the prayer "my house should be a place of prayer for all the people".
5. The purpose of my letter is not to lay blame or initiate legal proceedings... many experts over the years have dealt with all these issues.. this is not my goal.
6. I turn from the depths of my heart first to you and to your conscience, and only after that to your intellect and straight logic.. to do the right thing, from the perspective of "Nachshon's jump"..
7. "Nachshon's jump" is known as a unique act of a son of the tribe of Benjamin - when the Jews left Egypt and stood by the edge of the sea, Nachshon ben Aminadav jumped in. When he did so, the sea then split and the Jewish people passed through on dry land.... 
8. The historic brazenness and strength of that act also has an equivalent  in the Christian tradition when Jesus jumped, as is described in the theological books ...
9. What is the challenge, the request, the idea, the jump, that I, the little one, am asking for?
10. The time has come that the vessels that were stolen at the time of historic and difficult events and they were taken to Rome and are there until this day under the rule of the Vatican under your leadership should have their status changed.
11. If until now these items could be seen as stolen items and those holding them as the long hands  of those who destroyed the Temple, it is in your hands to change the status and see their holding on to these vessels today as being faithful to caring for them.
12. This faithfulness is one of respect and honor, and as all it stands by the main beneficiary of this faithfulness - the Jewish people.
13. It is therefore in your hands to take this leap, return the respect to those holding the vessels at the same time as those who  would benefit from the vessels being returned when you step on the Holy Land.

For all this I request that you dedicate some of your time to consider in your heart and soul that which has brought you to this great position, and use this to prepare, to gather, to pack and to take with you when you come to Israel the holy vessels, to give them over for safekeeping forever to the Jewish nation. 

With all respect,
Rav Yonasan Shtencel


and I just found this related video..



I cant wait to see their response....

Tzippi Livni's latest attack is, once again, on HaBayit Heyhudi. I am not even sure why she is attacking them, as they are not her political opponents. I don't think anybody is wavering between the choices of the Tzippi Livni party or HaBayit Hayehudi. But she has, and she continues, to go on the offensive, against them. And she has regularly picked Friday nights to air her accusations and claims, a time when they can't respond, don't even know about it, giving maximum air time to the allegations.

This time Livni has picked on Jeremy Gimpel. Her people seem to have been wading through hundreds of hours of video of Gimpel, and probably of other list members, looking for dirt. And she thinks she has found it. Livni's team discovered a piece of a lecture Gimpel was giving to a group of Christians, about a year ago, in which he was explaining a biblical passage from the book of Ezra. Livni claims Gimpel was inciting to violence by floating the possibility of someone blowing up the Dome of the Rock.

Here is the relevant clip, taken out of context of the lecture:


Naftali Bennet,  head of the party, went to the media and has defended Gimpel rather than throwing him under the bus. Good for Bennet. Some other leaders would likely have forced Gimpel's resignation just out of concern of some bad press.

Here is Bennet's response to the media:


I have not yet heard the criticism being picked up by other parties and moving to critical mass, so hopefully it will remain a minor spat started by a failing politician grasping for support. Livni's criticism puts into question every religious Jew, not just Jeremy Gimpel. We all pray daily for the rebuilding of the Temple. Some perhaps want it more, some perhaps want it less, but if you ask any religious Jew if he wishes for the rebuilding of the Temple, the response will be in the affirmative. And the rebuilding of the Temple automatically means the dismantling of the Dome of the Rock.

Perhaps blowing it up won't be the precise method used to dismantle it, or maybe it will be, but that is already getting into technical details of the larger point. I wonder, as was asked in a discussion by @BenjaminOfTudela, if Livni asked Elazar Stern, the number four on her party list, a religious man himself, what he thinks about the rebuilding of the Temple.

I personally find the solution employed by the Likud in the Ulpana complex of Beit El to be a reasonable solution for the Dome of the Rock, should the opportunity arise to rebuild the Temple. That would be to cut the building out of the ground, cut it into a few sections, relocate it and reconnect the parts. That seems to me to be a far less extreme method than "blowing it up".

And it is far less extreme of a removal process than waiting until the Third Temple will fall from heaven, as some believe will happen rather than being rebuilt by man, and crush the Dome of the Rock into smithereens...