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The Danger of Autonomy: Balancing Work and Spiritual Purpose in the Land
This week’s Torah portion, Bichukoti, outlines the national blessings that the Jewish people will enjoy if they observe God’s commandments and the curses that will afflict them if they do not. The blessings promise proper rain, crop growth and national security, whereas the potential curses depict the converse. The Jewish people at this point…
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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…
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Elul 2014
We are currently in the month of Elul, the Hebrew month preceding the days of awe. This is the month spent cultivating tishuvah. Tishuvah is often translated as repentance but literally means return. The Torah portion this week speaks of blessings and curses. The Jewish people are promised blessing if they listen to…
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Passover 2009
Regarding the Seder night Maimonides writes, “In every generation a person is obligated to see themselves as if they, right now, have gone out from the slavery of Egypt. So does the Torah write, “remember that you were a slave,” meaning it is as if you yourself were a slave and have gone out to…
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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…
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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…
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Kidoshim 2022
In this week’s Parsha, Kidoshim, the Torah writes, “Do not go about as a talebearer among your people, and do not stand idly by the blood of your fellow, I am God.” The Talmud (Sanhedrin 73a) states: “From where is it derived that one who sees another drowning in a river, or being dragged away…
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Passover 2022
Pesach, which falls this Friday night, commemorates the most important moment in Jewish history. We have no commandment to remember Saini, or the day we entered Israel, but we have many which commemorate the Exodus from Egypt because this moment of leaving Egypt and becoming a nation contextualizes who we are as Jews more than…
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Shabbat Hagodol 2022: Prayer and Diversity
I am in Israel this week to perform a wedding and, due to jet lag, I had the opportunity to walk very early this morning to Meah Shearim, a very religious neighborhood in Jerusalem, to pray. Around sunrise I went to the mikvah there and davened Shacharit at one of my favorite places to pray,…
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Shabbat HaChodesh 2022
This Shabbat has a special name, Shabbat HaChodesh, on which we read a maftir from Parshat Bo which contains the first commandment given to the Jewish people as a nation just before they leave Egypt: “Hachodesh hazeh lachem,” “This month (of Nisan) shall be to you the first of months.” The first Rashi on the…
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Lessons from Ezekiel and the Israeli Redemption
Haftorah Ezikiel The haftorah of Parshat Parah this week tells us that the exile of the Jewish people is a desecration of God’s name, a Chilul Hashem: “I scattered them among the nations, and they were dispersed through the countries, I punished them in accordance with their ways and their deeds. But when they came…
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Purim 2022
This week we celebrate the holiday of Purim. The Torah has messages for every time and generation. There are many lessons we can learn from Purim for our lives today. On a theological level we can learn about the invisible hand of Providence guiding the events of history, which is perhaps why the megillah, which…
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Shabbat Zachor: Remembering Amalek’s Challenge
This week is “Shabbat Zachor,” the “Shabbat of Remembering”. Since it is just before Purim and on Purim we were threatened by Haman who was a direct descendant of Amalek, we fulfill the biblical commandment this Shabbat to remember what Amalek did to us. We do this by reading a portion from Divarim about…
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Unity Through Equal Contribution and Respect for All Jews
This week is Shabbat Shekalim, which commemorates the giving of the half shekel to the Tabernacle in the desert. There were two kinds of gifts to the Tabernacle -any amount and any material one wanted to give, from the goodness of their heart, -and the half shekel which everyone had to give. The poor…
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Don’t Give Up the Shul: Synagogues as creative engaging institutions
Despite new alternatives to the synagogue model, I believe no other Jewish institution can equally build strong, encompassing, spiritual communities. The following are some guidelines, based on my work at Bais Abraham (Bais Abe) in St. Louis, for utilizing creativity and open-mindedness in generating more vibrant and engaging synagogue communities. Spiritual Tools It takes a…
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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…
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Why Some Orthodox Jews in Israel are Violent
Why don’t Orthodox Jews in America act violently against women who are not dressed modestly, while some in Israel do? There are to my knowledge almost no such outbursts in the USA, whereas in Israel we read about them quite often, such as this week http://www.jta.org/news/article/2011/12/27/3090916/israelis-rally-around-naama-women In fact the attitude of even right…