• Building More Than Walls: The Purpose of a Shul and the Heart of Community

    What is the role of a Jewish community and a shul?   Human beings develop via three pathways, the intellectual, the emotional and the social. Sufficient nurturing, education and guidance within our families of origin help us to do this. As Jews, we also must develop ourselves as spiritual and religious personalities. This is the primary…

  • Parshat Parah-Paradox and Purity: The Red Heifer, Purim, and the Hidden Unity of God

    This week we read the special maftir of Parah, which describes the strange commandment of the red heifer. If someone becomes impure through contact with a dead body, the purification process is via the ashes of a red heifer, which must be mixed with water and sprinkled upon them. The Kohen, the priest, who sprinkles…

  • Lag B’Omer, Politics and Jewish Unity

    This week we celebrate Lag B’Omer, the 33rd day of the Omer. Our tradition is that on the 33rd day, the plague that resulted in the death of Rabbi Akiva’s 24,000 students ceased. The Talmud tells us that the students of Rabbi Akiva all died between the holidays of Passover and Shavuot, “because they did not treat…

  • Yom Hashoah and the Two Sons of Aaron: The Fire, The Silence, and the Cry

    Tonight at Kesher Israel, we will commemorate the Holocaust, whose cruelty was far beyond comprehension. We Americans of the 21st century live relatively secure and prosperous lives. It is hard to fathom that less than 100 years ago, there was nothing cheaper than Jewish blood—that more than one out of every three Jews was murdered,…

  • Grace or Gratitude? Understanding God’s Gifts in Love and Merit

    Last week’s parsha began with Moshe beseeching God to let him cross into Israel, “V’etchanan el Hashem,” “I pleaded with God at that time, saying…Let me, I pray, cross over and see the good land on the other side of the Jordan…” Rash”i comments that the word va’etchanan (to plead or beseech) means to request…

  • Lessons of the Three Weeks for a Polarized World

    Shabbat Shalom from Jerusalem. This coming week, with the fast of the 17th of Tamuz, begins the Three Weeks of mourning for the destruction of the Temple and the exile. The Talmud tells us that destruction comes to the Jewish people when they are divided, when there is hatred among us. This turns out to…

  • Adar’s Unique Joy: Finding Celebration in Transformation

    This week began the month of Adar Sheni, the month in which Purim falls. The Talmud tells us, “When Adar begins, we increase joy.”  But why specifically in this month? If it is because the happy holiday of Purim falls in this month, what about the month of Tishrei when Sukkot falls? After all, Sukkot…

  • Embracing Truth and Tension at Sinai

    This Torah portion, in which the Torah is given, strangely is named after Yitro—Moses’ father-in-law who was not a Jew, but a priest of Midian. Why? What is so special about Yitro? I think the answer may lie in a perplexing medrash. The Talmud (Sanhedrin 94a) states: “It was taught in the name of Rabbi…

  • From Destruction to Strength: Rethinking Yom HaShoah’s Message

    This week, Kesher Israel held a beautiful Yom Hashoah commemoration. An energetic Holocaust survivor in her 90s spoke about her experiences, memorial candles were lit by children and grandchildren of survivors and victims, and I spoke about the need to remember so that it will never happen again. “Never Again” is the Holocaust memorial refrain.…

  • Birth, Death, and the Mikvah

    Tazria begins by telling us of the postpartum mother who is considered tameh, ritually impure, and therefore can not enter the Mishkan, the Tabernacle. Most sources of impurity in Judaism are associated with death, such as a dead body, the greatest source of impurity, or even a potential life that did not come to fruition,…

  • Grappling with Rising Antisemitism in a Shifting Zeitgeist

    Over the past five years and especially since October 7th, antisemitic acts have been on a sudden and jarring rise, and Kesher Israel has been no exception.  The number of incidents at Shul, whether people driving by and yelling “Heil Hitler,” or nearby graffiti about the situation in Israel, has risen in recent months.  This…

  • Wavering Notes, Resolute Souls: The Shalshelet of Identity and Transformation

    In this parsha, Tzav, we find something fairly unique, a Shalshelet, which is a very long repetitive trop (chanting) note, it wavers up and down three times.  This musical note appears four times in the Torah.   The first is when Lot, Abraham’s nephew, is told to leave Sidom.   The Torah records that Lot…

  • Earbuds, Tea, and Brotherhood

    I recently bought AirPods. If you are over 75, or have just returned from being shipwrecked on a Pacific atoll, these are the small, white earphones that everyone wears. This week, I traveled by train to New York for a two-day meeting of rabbis. On the train back, as I walked through the aisle with…

  • From Selfie King to Savior: Yosef’s Glow-Up in the Pit

    In this week’s Torah portion, Vayeshev, Yosef is 17 years old and quite self-involved. He is a dreamer and, as Rashi tells us, constantly coming his hair, and overly concerned with his outward appearance. He seems haughty, declaring his dreams to his family, which are perceived by his father and brothers as being about Yosef’s …

  • Purim 2024

    Like Chanukah, Purim, which we will be celebrating on Sunday, celebrates triumph and salvation, yet Purim and Chanukah feel very different. On Chanukah we focus on the victory—really, the far aftermath of the victory —the lighting of candles and celebration of the rededication of the Temple. We do not read about the Greek threat or…

  • How Struggling with Esaw Shapes Our Faith

    Where does faith in God and in Torah come from? There are many places—our tradition itself is certainly one source— the beauty of living a Jewish life itself is a fountain for, and practice of, faith. Additionally, there are “proofs” that medieval Jewish thinkers express such as the proof from design, that just as the…

  • Moments of Interfaith Connection and Inspiration

    This past week I shared a story in Shul which highlights one of the many ways that Kesher Israel is not only a vibrant community in Washington, D.C., but how, as the central congregation in our nation’s capital, makes deep impressions upon the world. Through the members it serves and the many groups and individuals…

  • Finding the Divine in Everyday Life

    In this week’s Torah portion, Tetzaveh, we continue to read about the Mishkan, the Tabernacle which takes up a great deal of the laws of the Torah. It is arguably the most central element in the Biblical communal life of the Jewish people. The Mishkan not only was a place of Divine service but represented…

  • Exploring the Spiritual Risks and Rewards of the Firstborn

    In this week’s Torah portion, Toldot, we read about Yakov and Esav, twins who are very different from each other.  Esav is a hunter- red, powerful, and hairy.  The Torah casts Yakov as the opposite-calm, tent-dwelling, and smooth.  Yitzchak their father loved Esav and wanted to bless him.  What was it about Esav which caused…

  • How Finding Your Voice Leads to True Freedom

    “The alphabet is an abolitionist. If you would keep a people enslaved, refuse to teach them to read.”  – Editorial on “Education in the Southern States,” in Harper’s Weekly, November 9, 1867 The Torah says in this week’s Parsha, Shemot, that after 210 years of slavery, the Jewish people cried out: “It was after many…