• Tabernacle, Shabbat, and the Risk of Idolatry

    With this week’s Torah portion, Pikudey, we will finish the book of Shemot, Exodus, and the reading of a 5 torah portion series that describes the tabernacle, a moving temple the Jews had in the desert, and its erection.   In these portions God describes the tabernacle to Moses while he is on the mountain…

  • On Modesty and Misogyny by Rabbi Hyim Shafner

    The sexual assault on CBS reporter Lara Logan in Tahrir Square last week brought me to think a bit about the role of modesty in religious countries.   Egypt is a country in which most women are religiously required or encouraged to cover themselves completely.  Yet paradoxically it is also a country in which women on…

  • Passover 2011 – The 10th Plague and the Sanctification of the First Born

    In the past few Torah portions we have been reading of the Jewish People’s Exodus from Egypt.  The 10th plague, the smiting of the firstborn, seems to be the final catalyst which precipitates Pharos’ freeing of the slaves.  Curiously, just after the firstborn in Egypt are killed the Jewish people are told, “…therefore you shall sanctify…

  • Rediscovering Prayer

    Perhaps I speak only for myself but I think generally we have lost the concept of prayer.  The upside of prayer in the Orthodox community is that we do it often.  But this is also the downside.  As a result of the commonness of our prayer I think, at least for me, prayer often can…

  • Does Orthodoxy Change?

    (The following is a message I wrote to my congregation and was also printed in the most recent newsletter of the Chicago Rabbinical Council (CRC).) Recently several Orthodox congregations that have embraced wider roles for women within their synagogues have been in the news and the subject of much internet banter.   Two come to mind.  First,  “partnership minyanim,” in which women…

  • The Theological Implications of Brussel Sprouts

    To be sure as Orthodox Jews we believe that God gave the Torah to be relevant for all times (yemot hamoshiach and the kashrut of bacon aside).   Often it is argued that it can not be the case that something in nature has changed which would render something in the torah to no longer be…

  • Halacha as Business -My Take on the Rotem Bill

    The recent (now tabled)  bill submitted to the Kenesset by MK Rotem expands the range of whom under law in Israel has the authority to perform conversions, and in addition severely limits anyone’s ability to retroactively undo a conversion performed in Israel.   The bill was formulated by Israel Baytenu, a non-religious party, to facilitate the…

  • What is the Purpose of Zionism?

    Although in the modern Orthodox community it is not PC to admit this, I am not a Zionist.   I did not grow up feeling or being taught that Israel, in the modern sense of the term, was essential for the Jews or for being Jewish.  I was taught that though Israel is a holy land,…

  • What is the Purpose of Zionism, Part 2

    Last week I wrote that it seemed from the torah that the goal of the Jewish people to be a “blessing to all the peoples of the world” as God tells Abraham, can only happen by going to the “land which I will show you,” and there becoming a “great nation.”  Why is it that…

  • Why We Need a Reversion of Conversion

    while back I sent a certain Orthodox rabbi a link to Rabbi Marc Angel’s article about conversion which appeared in the Forward http://www.forward.com/articles/11985/ in which Rabbi Angel argues quoting former chief Sephardic Rabbi Uziel, that we should err on the side of accepting converts rather than rejecting them and criticizes the high barriers the Chief Rabbinate of…

  • Religious Zionism, Creativity, and the Future of the Jewish People

    In a recent Jerusalem post article rabbi Daniel Gordis wrote that in his view there is no creativity in the torah of religious Zionism and that indeed since rabbi Solovetchik and rabbi kook there has not been any.   As a result he does not feel that religious Zionism is able to speak to secular Jews…

  • Rav Samet’s Yeshivah in Lod and the Creativity of Talmud Study

    There are several Torah scholars who derive creative philosophical, psychological, and quite modern thoughts from the Tanach and Midrash.  Among these authors is most notably Aviva Zorenberg, and I think she herself would argue, the Midrash itself.  There are also those commentaries that take the same approach to Agaditah, the narrative sections of the Talmud. …

  • More on Rav Samet’s Yeshivah in Lod and the Creativity of Talmud Study

    January 15, 2010 There are several Torah scholars who derive creative philosophical, psychological, and quite modern thoughts from the Tanach and Midrash.  Among these authors is most notably Aviva Zorenberg, and I think she herself would argue, the Midrash itself.  There are also those commentaries that take the same approach to Agaditah, the narrative sections…

  • The Importance and Value of Creativity in Talmud Study

    I and my family are living in Israel for the next 5 months on sabbatical.  Though we are living in Jerusalem I commute each day to the city of Lod to learn torah in the kollel of Rabbi Israel Samet.  It is a small group of mostly young married men who have finished their army…

  • Mount Morayah: Fulcrum of Exile and Redemption, Sacrifice and Reprieve; and some other thoughts about unity

    I am on Sabbatical in Jerusalem for 6 months.  Here is the first of several video highlights of the city/Divrey Torah I hope to do for the folks back home.  To Enjoy click below

  • Unwittingly Desecrating G-d’s Name

    How should we act as Orthodox Jews? Today I was talking to a congregant who told me that her in-laws who are Reform and not observant, asked her why Orthodox Jews are badly mannered.   They said, “so and so’s son became a baal tishuvah (newly observant) and now he is mean to, and rejecting of,…

  • A Jewish blogger looking at the bigger picture….

    Though I have spent some time over the past few years writing in the blogosphere, most of it has been on Morethodoxy.org, a blog I write with three other Orthodox rabbis.   We started writing it because we felt that the center and left of Orthodox Judaism, often termed “Modern Orthodoxy,” instead of bringing together…

  • Rosh Hashanah 2009

    The Talmud states:  “We anoint kings next to a spring of water so that their kingship should continue to give forth like a spring…Rabbi Ammi said, “If one is about to engage in business and wishes to know whether he will succeed or not, let him get a rooster and feed it; if it grows…

  • Manna and Responsibility: Balancing Self-Reliance and Divine Gratitude

    In this week’s torah portion, Ekev, the Jewish people stand on the eastern bank of the Jordan River about to enter the land of Israel and Moses speaks to them as he does throughout the whole book of Deuteronomy, reminiscing about the past 40 years and giving the Jews words of rebuke and strength for…

  • Women and the Leniencies that come from being Strict

    Yesterday someone asked me why women on the women’s side in my Shul sing-along with the congregation whereas at the previous synagogue the person had attended the women had not been permitted to sing.  I explained that even though the Talmud says the voice of the woman is considered sexual, within Jewish law there are…