The Blog @ ArtScroll.com

A decade ago, at a forum sponsored by the Chofetz Chaim Heritage Foundation, Rav Pam zt’l, venerable rosh yeshiva of Torah Vodaath, made a plea – and issued a challenge. The topic he was speaking about was ona’as devarim – hurtful speech, which, in Rav Pam’s own words “…is comprised of words that cut deeply and cause a great deal of pain, and is the cause of many tragedies.” So much had been done to educate the Jewish world about the dangers of loshon hora, of speaking ill of others. But what about the negative words that one person said not about another, but to another? What about the biting remarks, the criticisms, the insults, which led, Rav Pam said, to broken hearts, broken homes, and broken lives? Then Rav Pam issued the challenge: “Much more needs to be said publicly about the tragedy spawned by ona’as devarim. This concept needs the kind of exposure that has been applied to loshon hora in recent years…”

Positive Word Power, published by ArtScroll/Mesorah in conjunction with the Chofetz Chaim Heritage Foundation, is the answer to Rav Pam’s words. Following the extraordinarily successful format of The Chofetz Chaim: A Lesson a Day on the laws of loshon hora, Positive Word Power focuses on our verbal interactions with people. “Positive Word Power is not about verbal abuse,” says one of the editors who was involved in the multi-year, collaborative effort. “This is about the nuances of conversation, the little differences that can make a big difference. It’s about the small criticisms that we keep repeating.”

Positive Word Power identifies the negative speech patterns that we often tend to follow, and shows us how to replace them with encouraging, affirming ones. Each entry includes a scenario that shows us how to put the positive speech into our real life interactions. “You will find yourself in these scenarios,” says the project’s editorial director. “The scenarios are so believable – you’ll keep saying, ‘hey, that could be me!’”

Rav Pam said, on that historic day: “The result [of refraining from ona’as devarim] would surely be fewer marital problems, less estrangement of children from their parents and fewer dropouts from the yeshivos… powerful words should be written about this topic…” At last, those “powerful words,” and the blessings that refraining from ona’as devarim bring, are available to anyone who can give a few minutes a day to learn “Positive Word Power.”

 Good news for Rabbi Zelig Pliskin’s thousands of devoted readers: his newest book, Life is Now, has just been released.  One of the book’s chapters is titled “Joy Made Easy.”  During a recent conversation with Rabbi Pliskin I saw how true those words are. It’s easy to be joyful when you’re talking to this warm, effervescent and ultra-positive personality, author of many bestselling ArtScroll books. Some highlights of the conversation:

On happiness:  “People think it’s so hard to be happy. I lead a ‘Joy Club’ in Jerusalem. We meet once a month to talk about happiness, gratitude, kindness.  At one of the meetings, someone asked: what happens, a person just lost his job – how can he be happy? The idea is — we’re always in the present moment, and in this moment we can create a moment of joy, whatever the circumstances. In other words, focus on the present – and find the happiness that is in the here and now.”
On his new book, Life is Now: “This is a very important book. It’s teaching the skill of learning joy: to live in the present. Most distress comes from excessive and unnecessary focusing on the past and/or unnecessary and unproductive focusing on what might go wrong in the future. What we’re looking for is a wise balance between past, present, and future.”
On how to be happy: “Life is Now takes the reader through a ‘self-creation workshop.’  We examine the key elements that create us: our self-talk, our self-image, our goals, and our ‘traits & states.’  We see the ten biochemical changes that take place when we feel happy. One chapter is devoted to how to start your own ‘happiness club,’ giving the 9 principles a ‘happiness coach’ must learn to follow. The book gives us practical strategies to help us create a moment of joy right now, things like taking a ‘joy walk’ or even baking ‘joy cookies.’ They sound like small things, but that moment of joy can change our lives.”

To hear Leah Jacobs, co-author of the classic Shidduch Secrets, talk about  her book, the “shidduch crisis,” and how to successfully find your “bashert,” , click here.

 Not far away from such venerable American institutions as the Capitol and the Smithsonian stands the U.S. Patent Office. Here we can find more than 5 million patents, fascinating records of humanity’s imagination and ingenuity. Among them are those that brought light (patent number 12631 — the incandescent light bulb) and knowledge (patent number 3120606 — ENIAC, the world’s first computer) to the world.

And then there is ArtScroll’s unique Interlinear Translation system (patent number 6778950) which brought both light and knowledge to the world in a very different way.

 The original ArtScroll translations introduced hundreds of thousands of English speakers to the beautiful and timeless words of Torah and Jewish prayer. Yet one thing was lacking in all translations: they always appeared on the opposite facing page. It was difficult for someone who wanted to follow the translation along, word for word, with the original Hebrew.

 The answer to the problem was clear:  to place an English language translation immediately beneath the Hebrew words. But that raised another challenge: how to deal with the fact that Hebrew reads from right to left, while English reads in the opposite direction, from left to right? How could the English translation be readable, if you had to read it backwards?

 That challenge brought about an innovation so revolutionary that it became the only patented translation system in the world of Jewish publishing. The ArtScroll Interlinear Translations, in the various Schottenstein editions, use an arrow system that guides the eye gently, directing it through the full text in the proper direction. Not sure what a word means in the Chumash or Siddur? Just glance down below and see the translation right there. Want to understand the meaning of an entire phrase or sentence? Your eye moves down to the English and then rapidly, almost unconsciously, follows the arrows to read a flowing, word for word translation, from right to left, from left to right, without interruption.

 The Interlinear Translations have revolutionized the way English speakers learn and pray. With the publication of Sefer Devarim, the Schottenstein Interlinear Chumash is now complete, in five volumes. Many other classic works are available in the interlinear format: the Siddur, the Machzor, the Hagaddah, Megillas Esther, Sefer Tehilim, Zemiros, Pirkei Avos, and the Vidui service.

 The very best inventions change the way we live. The ArtScroll/Mesorah Interlinear translations have changed the way we read, learn, and pray. And what could be more important than that?

As the Tisha B’Av fast comes to an end, hear Rabbi Nosson Scherman share thoughts for the last hour of Tisha B’Av. Listen to “ArtScroll on the Air”  with Nachum Segal,  this Thursday night, AM 620 in the NY/NJ area from 8:00-8:30 PM and also on www.nachumsegal.com.

He writes about “regular people who do great things.” Rabbi Binyomin Pruzansky talks about his stories, his books, his life.  To hear an inspiring interview, click here.

 Many people find the days leading to Tisha B’Av a fitting time to study and reflect upon the Holocaust, the terrible churban of contemporary times.  Certainly, books on the Holocaust place us in the somber, mournful mood so appropriate to this sad season. But more: while difficult and often heart-wrenching, many accounts of the Holocaust can give us the strength to deal with Jewish suffering. We cannot comprehend the tragedy, but we can gain inspiration from the greatness that many Jews showed in the face of their ordeals.

ArtScroll/Mesorah has a large number of books dealing with many different facets of the Holocaust. Just a small sampling:

Sparks of Glory: This groundbreaking work was published decades ago, and has just been re-released after being out of print for many years. As timely now as it was upon its first publication, it is a compilation of incredible tales of spiritual heroism told by survivors in the DP camps directly to the author, Rabbi Moshe Prager. The original Hebrew was published before the Eichmann trial, at a time when Holocaust victims and survivors were looked upon as “sheep going to the slaughter”  – to be pitied, perhaps, but not respected. This work was one of the first to show the spiritual strength and resistance that Jews exhibited under the most horrific conditions.

Live, Remember, Tell the World: The author, Leah Kaufman, was only nine when she and her family were driven on a death march. Somehow she lived, and, all alone, remained true to her parents’ faith in Hashem and love of His  Torah. An inspiring, almost unbelievable memoir.

Shoah: A Jewish Perspective on the Holocaust: Two distinguished Torah scholars, Rabbis Yoel Schwartz and Yitzchak Goldstein, took on the daunting task of dealing with the hashkafah of suffering, as seen through the prism of the Holocaust. A truly remarkable work of Jewish thought.

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Rabbi Heshy Kleinman, author of the bestselling Praying With Fire  and Praying with Fire Volume 2, talks about his books, and how we can tap into the incredible power of prayer. To hear this inspiring interview, click here.

There is no tragedy in the history of the world that has been marked for so long, by so many, and with such depth of feeling, as the destruction of the  Temple. Year after year, generation after generation, exile after exile, the Jewish People have remained faithful to the memory of the Temple and the mourning that marks its two destructions.
ArtScroll offers a large selection of books and tapes that help us today, more than 1900 years later, understand and mourn this greatest of losses – and anticipate the rebuilding that awaits us. A sampling:
The ArtScroll Kinnos: If anything captures the tragedy of the Churban, it is the Kinnos, the elegies composed to lament the Temple’s destruction. This translation and commentary makes the Kinnos accessible and meaningful, and includes the full prayer service for the entire Tisha B’Av, with every part of the service in its place – like a “machzor” for Tisha B’Av. 
Kinnos for Tisha B’Av, 2 CD set, by Rabbi Yisroel Reisman. The famed author, rav and popular lecturer explains the Kinnos in his own inimitable style.
The ArtScroll Eichah (Lamentations) translated and with commentary by Rabbi Meir Zlotowitz: Written by the prophet Yirmiyahu, the heartbreaking words of Eichah touch our hearts and spirits. The flowing translation and illuminating commentary, drawn from Talmudic and Rabbinic sources, with an Overview by Rabbi Nosson Scherman, captures the beauty and tragedy of the original. One of the first works ArtScroll ever published, this became an instant classic.
Tisha B’Av: Text, Readings, Insights by Rabbi Avrohom Chaim Feuer and Rabbi Shimon Finkelman: An inspiring collection to enrich the day, this classic work includes historical background, insights into the Churban, and selected laws and customs.
Rav Schwab on Iyov: Though most Torah study is forbidden on Tisha B’Av, Sefer Iyov, the Book of Job, may be learned, as its theme of human suffering makes it especially appropriate for this day of Jewish pain. Rav Shimon Schwab, zt’l, one of the foremost Torah scholars of his day, explains the profound words of Iyov in terms we can all understand.
Tisha B’Av with Bina, Benny, and Chaggai Hayonah by Yaffa Ganz: A beloved children’s author introduces young readers to Tisha B’Av, giving them an understanding of the Beis HaMikdash that we lost and the Redemption we all await. With lovely four color illustrations and charming characters that educate as they enchant the children.

Rabbi Dr. Abraham J. Twerski talks about the financial meltdown, and how to deal with today’s new financial reality — and come up smiling! To listen to this fascinating and timely interview on The Nachum Segal Show, click here.