THE QUESTION WAS, why are the “small” mitzvos that people tend to “walk all over” the ones that prove a person’s commitment? The answer is embedded in this story in the Gemora.

THERE IS A difference between being frum, and living frum. It’s like being a soldier. Most soldiers are not soldiers. They are citizens forced to be soldiers because that is what the situation demands. But first chance they have to get out of the army and back to civilian life, they will take it.

THE GEMORA SAYS that any generation in which the Temple has not been rebuilt, it is as if it was destroyed in that generation (Yerushalmi, Yoma 5a).

THE LAWS OF kashering are many and confusing, and learned from this week’s parsha. Thanks to Midian, we’re still in exile.

“Master of the Universe, You know very well that our desire is to perform Your will. What prevents us? The ‘yeast in the dough’ (yetzer hara) and the oppression of nations. It should be Your will to save us from them in order to do Your laws with a complete heart.” (Brochos 17a)