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Mrs. Michal Horowitz is a Torah teacher whose shiurim reach audiences worldwide. She teaches weekly in her Five Towns, NY, community and lectures nationally and internationally. A longtime presenter for the OU Women’s Initiative, she inaugurated the Torat Imecha Nach Yomi program. In September 2023, she was invited by Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis to serve as the first female scholar to keynote the Annual Pre-Yamim Noraim Conference for the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth. She is the author of Abled: Living With a Disability, a Torah View (Mosaica Press, 2025) and lives in Woodmere, NY, with her family.
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Dvar Haftorah
OU Women's Initiative
Founding Director
Rebbetzin Dr.
Adina Shmidman
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The Echo of Effort
Amos 9:7–15
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וְנִגַּ֤שׁ חוֹרֵשׁ֙ בַּקֹּצֵ֔ר
“When the plowman shall meet the reaper” (Amos 9:13)
In describing the overflowing bounty of the end of days, the Navi Amos envisions a striking image: the plowman meeting the reaper. When do these two ever meet? The Malbim explains that the plowman, arriving to prepare the earth in the spring, will encounter the reaper still harvesting the previous year’s crop. The abundance will be so great that the harvest will extend for months.
On a deeper level, these two figures reflect two dimensions of the human experience. As the plowman, we labor in this world—הזורעים בדמעה—we sow with effort, often with strain, and without the privilege of seeing the outcome. We invest in our homes, our work, and our communities, yet the results are not always visible. At times, they emerge only years later—like children who come to understand their parents’ choices only in adulthood.
As the reaper, however, we stand on the other side. We benefit from what has been planted before us, often without fully recognizing the labor that made it possible. We receive, we partake, yet we do not always pause to acknowledge the effort behind the blessing.
Amos offers a vision of convergence. The plowman will meet the reaper. In that future moment, effort and outcome will no longer be distant from one another. The distance between planting and harvesting will close, allowing us to see, with clarity, the connection between what we give and what we receive—and to respond with a fuller sense of gratitude for the gifts Hashem places in our lives.
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