• 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…

  • 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…

  • Connecting to Our Ancestors in Challenging Times

    We have been here before,- on the seder night of the first Pesach, in Egypt, the Jewish people could not leave their houses for fear of the threat on the outside.  Though it’s true that they had each other in groups that first Pesach, how many times in Jewish history were Jews eating matzah hiding…

  • From Sinai to the Tabernacle

    In this week’s torah portion, Tzav, the torah continues its description from last week of the sacrifices and their rituals.   For us who live in the current period of time in the Western world animal sacrifice is fairly foreign and seems in many respects barbaric.   To us perhaps reading about the sacrifices in…

  • Understanding Sacrifices: Perspectives from Torah and Tradition

    In this week’s Torah portion, Tzav, the torah continues its description from last week of the sacrifices and their rituals.   For us who live in the current period of time in the Western world animal sacrifice is fairly foreign and seems in many respects barbaric.   To us perhaps reading about the sacrifices in the Torah…

  • The Power of Hands and Heart in Blessing

    This week’s Parsha, Shemini, tells the story of what happened on the eighth day of the Tabernacl’s existence, the day following the seven day process of inaugurating the Kohanim, the Priests, to prepare them for Temple service.   On this eighth day, one of the first acts as Kohen Gadol, High Priest, that Aaron performs…

  • Hidden Treasure: Spiritual Growth in a Time of Isolation

    This Shabbat we read the double portion of Tazria and Metzora which discuss the different kinds of impurity resulting from Tzaraat, a Biblical skin disease seen by our sages as a physical manifestation of spiritual malady.  The Torah commands that  if Tzaraat affects a house, the house must first be shut up for seven days…

  • Balancing Awe and Comfort in the Sanctuary

    Recently we all have undergone a shift of expectations and assumptions regarding Jewish life in the diaspora.   Now we are surprised and a bit unnerved when a synagogue does not have armed guards at its entrance.   How does this change of attitude, this fear, impact us on a communal and psychological level? This…

  • Connecting Through Community in a Time of Separation

    This week’s second Parsha, Kedoshim, begins, “You shall be holy because I the Lord your God am Holy.  A man must fear his mother and father and guard my Shabbats, I am God”.  Rash”i tells us that this parsha was read at Hakel (the gathering of the entire Jewish people in Jerusalem every seven years),…

  • The Danger of Sacrificing What Matters Most

    In this week’s double Torah portion, Acharey Mot and Kidoshim, the Torah tells us:  “Say further to the Israelite people: Anyone among the Israelites, or among the strangers residing in Israel, who gives any of his offspring to Molech, shall be put to death; the people of the land shall pelt him with stones.  And…

  • The Torah’s Call to Combat Bias and Lashon Hara

    This week we read the double parsha of Acharey Mot and Kedoshim.  Acharey Mot deals mostly with the laws of Yom Kippur and forbidden sexual relations and Kidoshim is filled with a wide variety of laws, both ritual and interpersonal.  In Kedoshim the Torah states: “You shall not be unfair in judgment, do not favor…

  • Responsibility in the Face of Tragedy

    This Shabbat is the double parsha of Bihar-Bechukotai.   In Bechukotai we read of the blessings and curses which outline the good things that will happen to the Jews as a nation if they obey the word of God and the terrible things which will befall them if they do not.   Though these end…

  • From Exile to Redemption: The Power of Transition

    This week’s double parsha of Bihar and Bechukotai begins with shemitah, the commandment to let the land lay fallow every seven years.   One of the purposes of this mitzvah is for us to realize that we are not in charge.  We do not make the rain fall or the crops grow, nor did we…

  • Embracing Change on the Road to Redemption

    This week’s double parsha of Bihar and Bechukotai begins with shemitah, the commandment to let the land lay fallow every seven years.   One of the purposes of this mitzvah is for us to realize that we are not in charge.  We do not make the rain fall or the crops grow, nor did we…

  • The Tension of Sinai and Shmita

    This week’s double Torah portion of Bihar and Bichukoti begins, “And G-d spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai saying, speak to the Children of Israel and say to them, when you enter the land which I am giving you the land must rest a Sabbath to G-d…six years you shall plant….and the seventh year shall…

  • Herman Wolk: A Legacy of Faith, Learning, and Resilience

    This morning I went to the shiva for our oldest congregant, Herman Wolk, who died at 103 years old this past week.  The shiva was held in New York at one of the many orthodox Shuls that he attended over his 103 years.  In an act of amazing hakarat hatov, gratitude, his nephew told me…

  • Lessons from Rabbi Akiva’s Students

    Our Parsha, Emor, continues with the theme of holiness from last week’s Parsha.  This week we read about the holiness of the Kohanim and of the holidays and Shabbat which are called mikraey kodesh, “times of holiness”.   We are also in the midst of the counting of the Omer, a period that in Mishnaic…

  • 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…