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Times: Shabbat starts on Friday at 7:32 pm and ends on Saturday at 8:33 pm. The weekly Torah portion is Noach.
Mincha is 1.45pm: On Mon/Tue at ABL – 21/333 Collins, on Wed at Warlows Legal – 2/430 Lt Collins, and on Thurs at L1 Capital – 28/101 Collins. Join the WhatsApp group to stay across the latest details.
The weekly lunch & shiur continues on Wed at 1.20pm at Warlows Legal – 2/430 Lt Collins – and via zoom, followed by mincha at 1.45pm. Current topic: duty of care for a borrower. Details here and on the WhatsApp group.
Thought of the Week with thanks to Avi Gordon.
This weeks Parsha famously starts with the words “These are the offspring of Noach” however, curiously, the Passuk immediately veers off the subject and starts talking about the righteousness of Noah and not about his children.
Rashi, the foremost commentor on the Torah, immediately explains that “offspring” doesn’t necessarily mean have to mean physical children, but can sometimes allude to, as it does in this case, to mitzvot / good deeds that were given ‘birth to’.
Rav Moshe Feinstein asks, despite Rashi’s explanation, the question still stands, why did the possuk use the word ‘offspring” which generally implies actual physical children? If the actual understanding is supposed to be about good deeds, why not just use the most appropriate term about good deeds so that the question wouldn’t arise in the first instance.
Rav Moshe answers that the Torah is teaching us a deep lesson. We love our children more than anything in world. Whether they behave or not, are challenging or easy, our love knows no bounds for them. Rav Moshe explains, the Torah is telling us that the same approach and love needs to be demonstrated for Mitzvot too. Whether its an easy mitzva for us or a hard one- we need to show the same love and dedication to them like they were our children
May we all be blessed to have healthy children that give nachas to us as well as show love and dedication to mitzvos and give our Father nachas.
Credit- Rav Pinchas Roberts.