“I grew up in the ’60s, a time when everyone was finding their way,” reminisces Rabbi Sholom Weingot. “Because I was always very individualistic, even as a yeshiva bachur, I learned to also look at other people as unique individuals and try to understand their needs.”

This statement revealed to me where Rabbi Weingot was coming from. The director of Bnainu, a Baltimore-based organization that provides chinuch (Jewish education) services for children and families, Rabbi Weingot held an intimate meeting this July for a core group of women. He hopes to spread his simple yet revolutionary grassroots movement as widely as possible. Its purpose? To reach deeper levels of communications and promote listening on a higher level.

The festivities at Arugas Habosem were planned for March 20, 2018 (4 Nissan). That was the day that Rabbi Shaya Taub’s congregation on Clark’s Lane would pour the boros (pools) for its new mikveh. Unfortunately, the celebration was cut short when the sad news arrived that the Rebbetzin’s mother, Rebbetzin Chava Israel, a”h, was nifteres.

Rebbetzin Israel, mother of Rebbetzin Malka Faiga Taub, was a well-known figure in Williamsburg, where she was cofounder, along with Satmar Rebbetzin, Rebbetzin Alta Feige Teitelbaum, a”h, of the renowned Bikur Cholim D’Satmar, in 1957. In fact, decades ago, in recognition of her exemplary Bikur Cholim volunteerism, Rebbetzin Israel was asked to rise at a dinner held in the Waldorf Astoria, where she received a thunderous ovation from over 2,000 attendees, which included 99 Bikur Cholim volunteers.

Here, Rebbetzin Taub graciously shares a glimpse of her powerhouse parents and her childhood.

The blaring Israeli music with the distinct “workout beat” piqued my curiosity. I peered inside the room off the lobby of the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Stamford, Connecticut, last month, and saw women of all ages doing something I had never seen before: “kangoo dancing.” Wearing elevated jump shoes on springs that allowed them to “pogo” to the wild beat, they seemed to be having the time of their life as they danced in pairs and solo. You would never guess that the circumstance that brought them together was the tragic loss of their husbands.

The Shabbaton was a joint project of Samchainu, a support organization for widows founded over 11 years ago by Breindy Halberstam and Shani Stefansky Waldman, and Nagilla, a Lakewood-based support group for widows. In Hebrew, samchainu means “our joy,” and while watching the women dance, smiling ear to ear, it struck me how apropos the name is.

Rebbetzin Fruma Rochel Altusky has several claims to fame. Among them are her maternal grandparents, American Torah pioneers Rabbi Yaakov Yosef and Aidel Herman (of All for the Boss fame) and her illustrious parents, Harav Chaim Pinchas and Rebbetzin Basha Scheinberg. But if you ask her what she feels her biggest yichus is, she will tell you it is being the first girl to attend the very first Bais Yaakov high school in America.

Rebbetzin Altusky’s life spans three continents. She was born and spent her earliest years in Mir, Poland, where her father was learning in the yeshiva. Her parents moved to the Lower East Side of Manhattan in 1935, when she was four years old. She grew up in New York and married Rav Chaim Dov Altusky. After teach for many years in New York, the Altuskys moved to the Mattersdorf section of Yerushalayim in 1965, joining her parents after the relocation of her father’s yeshiva, Yeshivas Torah Ore.

It is not unusual for pulpit rabbis to run from simcha to simcha – literally! Attending a bris, engagement party, and wedding in a single day is par for the course. But on March 9, two Baltimore rabbis rose to a different kind of rabbinical running challenge.

It all began when Rabbi Moshe Hauer, Rav of Bnai Jacob Shaarei Zion, and Rabbi Binyamin Marwick, Rav of Shomrei Emunah, answered the call for “a few good clergymen.” The call was issued by Rabbi Meir Kaniel. The running-enthusiast social worker is the program coordinator of the RabbisCanRun Challenge, which was held for the second consecutive year, this time within the annual 10K Jerusalem Marathon.

Zev Zalman (Z.Z.) Ludwick is the only Breslover chasidic luthier in the state of Maryland – if not on the entire East Coast. Most likely, he is the only one in the world. (In case you were wondering, a luthier is someone who makes stringed instruments.) Interestingly, it was a string of Divine Providence incidents that led this musician to discover his passion for building and repairing violins.

“I always wanted to make a living in music,” says Z.Z. I wanted to be a rock star from the time I was five, and I also wanted to be involved in building instruments from a young age. I really did not have the follow-through, though,” admits Z.Z., proprietor of Ludwick’s House of Violin, in Silver Spring. “After a few weeks of searching online for an apprenticeship, I was ready to give up this dream when the hand of Hashem touched the situation.”