Many have posted and reposted this picture and wondered whether this is a result of PhotoShop or a real advertisement: Yeshivat Orot HaZor'im started a new year with studying the Tractate of Shabbat. Here is the lovely answer. These are the words of Rabbi Gad Hermann, 12th grader teacher at Orot HaZor'im Yeshivah in the north of Israel:
"At the end of last year, there was a big ad on the billboard next to the Yeshivah about a new crime series on cable TV. It was viewed by all of the people who drove to the Yeshivah. In one of my talks, I spoke sorrowfully about the fact that this ad assumes, simply, that all of us are waiting and anticipating for this series to begin. The phrasing of the ad assumes that it is obvious that this is the kind of culture that everyone consumes and wants, 'for they are our lives and the length of our days, and we will think about them day and night'. I told my students: Just imagine if they would have advertised something completely different, positive things that take place - for example, that our class will soon begin learning a new chapter in the Shabbat Tractate in the Beit Midrash! These words entered my students' hearts. I didn't know anything about this, but during the summer vacation they worked, saved money and donated from their earnings to create such an ad. After designing the ad, they turned to the advertising company and rented the advertising space on this billboard. The project cost them over 2,000 shekels. On the first day of school I drove to the Yeshivah and just couldn't believe my eyes. Just like me, thousands of other drivers who pass by Moshav HaZor'im in the month of Elul are very moved when they see an ad of a totally different kind."
