Collected Archive of Shoemaker Reports
The Shoemaker Report is Rav Hoshea’s weekly Torah publication. Its focus is on internalizing and living Torah from the heart, not only from the head. The divrei Torah often take the parashah of the week as their point of entry and address central questions of inner avodah — including teshuvah, prayer (tefillah), emunah, bitachon, and related areas of spiritual and personal refinement.
The writing assumes seriousness from the reader and speaks from within Torah life, with meaning emerging organically from honest analysis of our holy Torah and the words of Chazal, rather than from short-lived inspiration or simplified conclusions.
Building the Mishkan: from Descent to Ascent In the beginning of Parashat Terumah, Hashem tells Moshe Rabbeinu to instruct B'nei Yisrael to bring donations of various materials in order to construct a sanctuary for Him to dwell in (Shemot 25:8): וְעָשׂוּ לִי מִקְדָּשׁ וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹכָם (And they shall make for
White Fire and Black Fire and the Mitzvah of Writing a Sefer Torah With hearts filled with emunah, B'nei Yisrael declared their willingness to accept all of the Torah even before they heard it (Shemot 24:7): כֹּל אֲשֶׁר־דִּבֶּר יְיָ נַעֲשֶׂה וְנִשְׁמָע (All that Hashem spoke we will do [na'aseh] and
Likutei Moharan 190 and Moshe's Extra Day: In Parashat Yitro, we read the account of Matan Torah, the Giving of the Torah. In Parashat Va'etchanan which relates what took place forty years later, Moshe Rabbeinu adds some details that weren't mentioned in the original account in Shemot. Breaking into the
A 'Thought Journey' to Expand One's Awe of G-d In Parashat Beshalach, we read about the splitting of the Yam Suf, a miracle that demonstrated Hashem's powers probably more than any other miracle He ever performed. Granted, most of us have not personally witnessed miracles like that where the laws
Seeing the Points of Good in Each Jew The story is told of the Tanna Elisha ben Avuyah who abandoned the ways of Hashem and became the heretic whom they called 'Acher' ['Other']. We won't go into the details of how he became a heretic for those who are interested
A Practical Strategy to Survive the Darkness Let's be honest. No matter who we are or what we do, the war is taking its toll on us, sucking away our vitality. Many of us are sad or depressed. Grief, despair, worry, and sleepless nights are all on the rise. We
The Abduction of Dinah and Swords of Iron “We should have carpet-bombed the whole place immediately after the massacres took place on Simchat Torah (October 7, 2023). We could even have used bunker buster bombs and wiped them out once and for all! We had the whole world on our
A 'How-to' Guide for Likutei Moharan 21:2 In last week's article entitled They Found One Sealed Flask of Oil, we discussed the meaning of a rather cryptic statement in the Sifra di'Tzniuta (Zohar ha-Kadosh, Terumah 178a): עַתִּיקָא טָמִיר וסָתִים זְעֵירָא דְּאַנְפִּין אִתְגַּלְיָיא ולָא אִתְגַּלְיָיא (Atika is hidden and sealed; Ze'ir
The Meaning Behind the Miracles of Chanukah Three kinds of intelligence [שֵּׂכֶל, seichel] are capable of illuminating the mind of man. The lowest level corresponds to what each and every one of us is capable of achieving on his own provided that he goes through a normal step by step
Yaakov's Encounter with the Ministering Angel of Esav After Yaakov Avinu conducted his family and possessions across the river when returning to what would eventually become known as Eretz Yisrael, we read the following in the Torah (Bereshit 32:25): וַיִּוָּתֵר יַעֲקֹב לְבַדּוֹ וַיֵּאָבֵק אִישׁ עִמּוֹ עַד עֲלוֹת הַשָּׁחַר (And Yaakov
How One Man's Sin Led to the Death of 36 Soldiers We are living through the greatest time of trouble experienced by Yaakov in over 75 years (and in certain respects, the most dangerous time that we have ever experienced on a global level), as it is written (Yirmeyahu 30:7):
Why the Body Should be a Source of Shame Tangentially to the main thrust of last week's article which focused on the necessity of modesty, we cited an interesting statement in the Kitzur Shulchan Aruch (3:1): וְהַצְּנִיעוּת וְהַבֹּשֶׁת מְבִיאוֹת אֶת הָאָדָם לִידֵי הַכְנָעָה לְפָנָיו יִתְבָּרַךְ שְׁמוֹ (Modesty [tzniut] and shame
