The excitement is mounting around the The Meaningful Life Center’s (MLC) 2nd MyLife: Chassidus Applied Essay Contest as MLC announced the first list of prestigious judges for this year’s contest (the list is in formation, with more judges to be confirmed shortly). “The huge popularity of this essay contest has attracted top scholars to serve as judges,” said Contest Director Sruli Baron.
The contest has become a powerful incentive for inspiring and empowering people across the globe to write essays applying ideas in Chassidus to solve contemporary life issues. With a little over two weeks left to submit essays, the contest is well under way. Submissions are streaming in from around the world. The contest guidelines are specifically engineered to give everyone an equal chance of winning.
The panel of judges is comprised of some of this generation’s most distinguished Torah and Chassidus scholars. Additionally, a special panel of Hebrew-fluent judges were chosen to review the large number of Hebrew essay submissions. These experts will be tasked with the responsibility of evaluating and selecting the winning essays, awarding $10,000 to the first place winner, $3,600 to the second place winner, and $1,000 third place.
5776 MyLife Judges – In Formation
Rabbi Leibel Altein
Dr. Yaakov Brawer
Dr. Shimon Cowen
Rabbi Yosef Y. Jacobson
Rabbi Sholom Lipskar
Rabbi Leibel Schapiro
Rabbi Ezra Schochet
Rabbi Faivish Vogel
5776 MyLife Hebrew Judges – In Formation
Rabbi Asher Farkash
Rabbi Yekusiel Farkash
Rabbi Zalman Gopin
Rabbi Yosef Y. Gourarie
Rabbi Yecheskel Sofer
Rabbi YY Jacobson shared his enthusiasm about serving as a judge for the second year in a row. He said, “I am excited to take part in this inspiring project and look forward to reviewing essays that apply Chassidus to real life. I have seen first hand the profound impact made by encouraging people to apply Chassidus in tackling life’s challenges.”
An anonymous donor is once again sponsoring this revolutionary Hafotzas Hamayonos initiative which encourages the study and application of Chassidus. Everyone is invited to submit an original essay applying an idea or methodology in Chassidus to solve a contemporary life issue. The essays will be blindly judged (meaning that the essay authors will be unknown to the judges) and the winner will be selected by the panel of judges according to a strict rubric of judging criteria. The strict rubric of judging criteria ensures that every essay is given a fair judgment.
Last year’s first place winner, Aryeh Gurewitz, currently learning at the Yeshivah Tiferes Bachurim in Morristown, had these words of encouragement to offer, “What’s exciting and encouraging is that it’s not necessarily the person who has learned the most or the deepest maamarim who will be able to communicate the concepts in a way that helps people really grow. I really believe that anyone who thinks deeply and carefully into a maamar or a perek of Tanya can find a way to make it relevant—even life-changing—to anyone.”
Contest Director Sruli Baron reports, “Last year over 530 entrants sprung into action to take the first ever MyLife Challenge. Over one million words—enough to fill 12 full volumes—were written, all applying Chassidus to our daily lives! These powerful essays empowered and inspired thousands of others across the globe with the teachings of Chassidus! This year we want to see this grow to new heights, doubling and even tripling its reach. We are already seeing submissions coming in from around the world. The challenge is one that engages so many people both young and old: How real is Chassidus to you?”
The deadline for contest submissions is February 24, 2016 (15 Adar 1) 11:59 PM EST. Visit meaningfullife.com/contest to view the contest rules and guidlines and to submit your essay.
The judges should be rabbis not women.
Women aren’t trained in Chasidus-Sir,you are very mistaken. There always seems to be some reason why we can’t be on this panel or school board or community council.
The reason there aren’t female judges is because the judges do a lot of working together and it wouldn’t be the most tznius to have men and women discussing everything together. Maybe next time the judges will all be women to solve this problem 😉 Anyway, I’m sure the real judges are the wives of the judges…
hence the inclusion of women in the contest but there aren’t female judges.
Please name three women who in your opinion are on-par with the list of Rabbis and mashpiim who were chosen.
The fact is that like it or not women are not trained in Chassidus and therefore the reality is that there aren’t any women on that level of scholarship.
(This does not mean that potentially a woman cannot understand chasidus just as well as a man).
… as appropriate learning for women, Ein Yaakov and CHASSIDISHE MAAMORIM.
My own take is this. In general, women tend to be more emotional than logical and therefore their Da’as, or power to connect their understanding or logic to their emotions or to real life situations is also weaker. It’s probably why they can’t be judges or witnesses in a court of law and generally don’t learn gemmara. It’s harder for them to be objective as they get easily affected emotionally. (Although, when it comes to personal issues they may bring brilliant arguments and use logic that even great scholars cannot think up (see hayom yom). But don’t be offended by… Read more »
I have just been reading some of last years essays found on the competition website. They are INCREDIBLE! I would absolutely love to read more …I’m convinced that out of 530 or so essays there are a lot more than a handful that can inspire us. Is the purpose of this competition for the writers only or to also influence others? It must be the latter for that is exactly what this generation needs…. for yiddishkiet to be made relevant and that is exactly what this competition is accomplishing … through ordinary people expressing deep ideas in a down to… Read more »
Not sure what everyone is getting riled up about. The Rebbe stated at numerous occasions that a woman is equally responsible to study Chassidus, and that she is not only equal but in some ways superior to men in understanding and applying Chassidus.
The choice of male judges has nothing to do with this fact. Male judges may be more appropriate for tznius or other reasons, unrelated to the capacity for women to excel and win in this contest.
I just counted and see that 6 out of the top 11 essays in last year’s contest were women.
Please
Y the insecurity?
If u would b truly secure and knowledgeable as to what is women’s position in Torah, u wouldn’t leap in offense all the time….stop looking to feel downgraded
And yes, I’m a woman and see nothing offensive that women are not on the panel, and am certain that women have the same chances of winning nonetheless.
Learn, learn,learn and you will be happy and secure with Torahs views on women- as they are very positive.
How did the agenda segue from the essay contest to praising/bashing women’s intellectual prowess?
A man recently said this line to me, apparently it’s from Torah: “noshim da’atayhen kalos”, I found it offensive and I’m looking for an expalnation and this seemed like a place I could find one.
The more Chasidus the women study the better Akeres Habayis they will be and become
To all those out there who can not comprehend a women learning deep Chassidus, you would be surprised, but the women are the ones who apply Chassidus to their actual lives and struggles. In high school and seminary that is there focus and you can tell by the pnimiusdik way they are mekushar to the rebbe and live their life.
I would greatly appreciated it if there would be a link to the essays so that some of us who would be interested, would be able to read them as inspiration and we could take ideas for incorporating these wisdoms into our own lives. Thank you in advance.
Maybe they were asked, and said no. you never know. Just relax man, everything is ok.
The Rebbe said the women’s MAIN goal is to be a ekeres habayis, how many women’s need education on that, today?!
for example? name women please, at least 3.
This year’s panel includes all of last years judges (except for Rabbi Eli Silberstein), plus more.
They explicitly state that more judges will be added. So let’s not jump to conclusions of who will and will not be included as judges. Additionally, it makes sense that some judges may decline from judging if they or their immediate family wnats to submit an essay.
Just wondering!
How does this panel of judges compare to last years?
Yes YY Jacobson was a judge last year.
Who else was last years & who is a new judge.
Rabbi Dr. Shimon Cowen very impressive!
I’m not so sure what you say is correct
why shouldn’t a women learn samech vov if she can handle it?
no contradiction to be a Akeres Habayis, it may just her enhance her perspectives etc.
women may suit the job but it may be because they can’t be judges!
why is there not a single woman on the panel? (and for the idiots who will inevitably say “there are no women knowledgeable enough,” please go and educate yourself and meet some of the incredibly learned and intelligent women out there.)
Y not 2 of the biggest Mashpeim & world’s fore most authorities on chassidus today, besides Reb Yoel Kahn, Reb Sholom Charitonow & Reb Nachman Schapiro ? U can’t get bigger than that !!! Y aren’t they on the judging panel ?
Very happy about this new project To the previous comments, I beg to differ and say that everyone need to know their place women have many major talents and know how to learn nicely but when we are talking about experts in chassidus you have to go to those which know it best Aditinaly although the Rebbes switch is that women should learn Torah it is not that women should start learning samach vov and deep mamarim like the Rebbe says the main job of a women is to be a עקרת הבית which is a very important task. Everyone… Read more »
I was wondering that too. Many women in chabad history knew chassidus well, such as Rebbetzin Menucha Rochel who was privileged to learn chassiuds from her father …. The women sending in the essays would prefer a female brain to judge her understanding of chassidus, sometimes which the males cannot get to the bottom of their bina yeteira.
Last year the two third place winners were women. the essays are judged without the authors names being visible to the judges.
How about adding some women to the panel, especially as many women enter (and win)?
lets prove girls learn too!