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Parashat Re’eh 5781
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| A D’var Torah for Parashat Re’eh By Rabbi Marc Rudolph (’04) Did you know that when we are awake, our brain generates 23 watts of energy, enough energy to light up a room? And that by simply opening our eyes, 75 percent of our brains’ energy is activated? Perhaps that is why this week’s parasha opens with the Hebrew word “Re’eh,” which means “see”. The Torah wants us to really use our brains! Yet those of us who pride ourselves on our ability to see ahead might have a particularly difficult time with the approach the Torah takes this week with respect to worship in the Land of Israel. We read numerous descriptions of the sacrifices and offerings that will be made when the Israelites reach the Promised Land, but strangely, we are not told where the holy place to offer those sacrifices will Read More > |
Parashat Eikev 5781
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Parashat Va’ethanan 5781
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Parashat Devarim 5781
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Parashiyot Mattot-Masei 5781
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Parashat Pinhas 5781
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Parashat Balak 5781
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Parashat Hukkat 5781
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Parashat Korah 5781
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Parashat Shelah 5781
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Parashat Beha’alotekha 5781
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Parashat Naso 5781
A D’var Torah for Parashat Naso
By Rabbi Matthew Goldstone
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Our parasha this week, Naso, contains a passage recited daily as part of the traditional liturgy, which many parents also use to bless their children each Friday night: The priestly blessing (Num. 6:22-27):
The Lord spoke to Moses:
Speak to Aaron and his sons: Thus shall you bless the people of Israel. Say to them:
The Lord bless you and protect you!
The Lord deal kindly and graciously with you!
The Lord bestow God’s favor upon you and grant you peace!
Thus they shall link My name with the people of Israel, and I will bless them.
There is a lot to unpack in this text, but for the moment I want to focus in on the last line of the trifold blessing: “The Lord bestow God’s favor upon you and grant you peace!” In light of the recent events Read More >
Parashat Bemidbar 5781
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Parashiyot Behar-Behukotai 5781
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Parashat Emor 5781
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Parashiot Aharei Mot / Kedoshim 5781
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| A D’var Torah for Parashiot Aharei Mot / Kedoshim By Rabbi Jill Hackell (’13) You shall rise before the aged and respect the elderly; you shall fear your God, I am the Lord.” [Leviticus 19:32] This verse is found in parashat Kedoshim, a parashah which begins with Moses transmitting these words of God to the community of Israel: “You shall be holy [kedoshim tehiyu], for I, the Lord God, am holy.” [19:1-2] What does it mean to be holy? What does God ask of us? Let’s look at our verse as an example. At one time, Israeli buses displayed the first part of this verse – mip’nei siva takum – literally, ‘Rise before the gray-hairs’, on signs, to remind younger riders that society expects them to give up their seats to their elders. What a wonderful way to create a society which teaches the value of Read More > |
Parashiot Tazria-Metzorah 5781
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Parashat Shemini 5781
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Shabbat, the 7th Day of Pesah – 5781
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Parashat Tzav 5781
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| A D’ver Torah for Parashat Tzav By Rabbi Michael Rothbaum (’06) At my shul, there are indications that we’re still in “Covid times.” With cameras and control panels, the sanctuary looks like a recording studio. We still have hand sanitizer dispensers all over the building. And, in the corner, there’s a cart of siddurim with a sign instructing people not to touch them. This last one, of course, makes no sense. The cart is from a year ago. We swiped it from the library — much to the chagrin of the shul librarian — and put it in the sanctuary. At the time, we asked people who were still coming into the building to leave used siddurim on the cart, where we would leave them for two weeks, until they were safe to use again. Remember those early days of Covid? When we afraid to touch anything? Since then, we’ve learned a lot Read More > |
Parshat Vayikra 5781
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Parshiyot Vayakhel-Pikudei
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Parashat Ki Tissa 5781
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Parashat Tetzaveh 5781
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| A D’var Torah for Parashat Tetzaveh By Rabbi Cantor Sam Levine (’19) לְפָנִ֣ים ׀ בְּיִשְׂרָאֵ֗ל כֹּֽה־אָמַ֤ר הָאִישׁ֙ בְּלֶכְתּוֹ֙ לִדְר֣וֹשׁ אֱלֹהִ֔ים לְכ֥וּ וְנֵלְכָ֖ה עַד־הָרֹאֶ֑ה כִּ֤י לַנָּבִיא֙ הַיּ֔וֹם יִקָּרֵ֥א לְפָנִ֖ים הָרֹאֶֽה׃ Formerly in Israel, when a man went to inquire of God, he would say, “Come, let us go to the seer,” for the prophet of today was formerly called a seer. (I Samuel 9:9)
My eleven-year-old son showed me a YouTube video last week of a man wearing a mask (the COVID kind) imprinted with a realistic picture of a man’s face with a mask pulled down below his nose and mouth (see it here if you like). As he walks into a place of business, someone asks him to please put his mask on properly. He pulls his mask down and the joke is exposed. The meta-mask prank on YouTube, timely for Read More > |
Parashat Terumah 5781
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Parashat Mishpatim 5781
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Parashat Yitro 5781
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Parashat Beshalah 5781
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Parashat Bo 5781
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Parashat Va’eira 5781
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Parashat Shemot – 5781
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Parashat Vayehi 5781
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Parashat Vayigash 5781
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Parashat Mikeitz 5781
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Parashat VaYeishev 5781
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Parashat Vayishlah 5781
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What Goes Around
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayishlah
By Rabbi Michael Rothbaum (’06)
The aphorism “what goes around comes around” is so ingrained in the English language as to seem timeless. I’d always assumed it was from a Shakespearean sonnet, or maybe one of Aesop’s fables.
But a little Googling reveals it to be of a much more recent vintage. The earliest citation I found was from an African American newspaper, The Pittsburgh Courier, in 1952. Today it refers to getting one’s comeuppance — and not in a good way. But in what appears to be the first time the phrase appeared in print, columnist Nat D. Williams uses it to express a positive sentiment. Williams writes with pride of African American athletes finally getting their chance to prove their ability in the Olympics and in Major League Baseball, offering Black spectators “a surge of pride in seeing the keen minds Read More >
Parashat Vayeitzei 5781
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Parashat Toledot 5781
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Parashat Hayei Sarah 5781
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Parashat Lekh Lekha 5781
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Parashat Noah 5781
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Parashat Bereishit 5781
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Parashat Ha’azinu and Yom Kippur 5781
Yom Kippur, Shofar, and Freedom
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ha’azinu and Yom Kippur
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
Why is it that a holy day which is supposed to be “awesome” has a reputation for many as being “awful?”
The 10 day period between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur is known as the Days of Awe – a time to reflect upon our lives, let go of the old, and chart an improved life path.
Yet, as we initially reflect upon Yom Kippur, so many of us tend to focus upon the discomfort of fasting. In many ways, fasting is counterintuitive to the way we currently live. We can watch television or access the Internet 24 hours a day. Shopping options are constantly available.
Yet, on Yom Kippur, while every instinct prompts us to open the fridge or cupboard to alleviate our hunger or thirst, we are told to push against that impulse – and to refrain from these, and Read More >
Parashat Nitzavim – Vayeilekh 5780
| Tomorrow’s Giants On Our Shoulders A D’var Torah for Parashat Nitzavim-Vayeilekh By Rabbi David Markus We stand on the shoulders of giants. Much that we have, much that we are becoming, are harvests of trees our ancestors planted. We inherit their shalshelet – their spiritual and practical causation both wise and unwise, healthy and not – along with what they received from their ancestry. Legacy courses through us as history’s heartbeat. We and how we live our lives are the next beat, the eternal river’s next bend on its endless flow. So of course, we stand on yesterday’s shoulders. But how about tomorrow’s giants on our shoulders? If we really felt the future on our shoulders, would we live differently? Torah’s Nitzavim-Vayeilekh asks that question directly. The Covenant is made with “everyone standing here today,” and also “everyone not standing here today” (Deut. 29:13-14). “Everyone not standing here today” are future generations (Rashi, Read More > |
Parashat Ki Tavo 5780
| A D’var Torah for Parashat Ki Tavo By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11) In the megahit musical Hamilton, there is a song with the repeated line, “Who lives, who dies, who tells your story?” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrMkdZtqiVI). The way that we know who we are and where we come from is through stories. Sometimes we call them myths; sometimes we call them history. There’s more overlap between those two than we’d like to admit. It is impossible to include every detail of something that’s happened in a story, so every single time we tell a story, we make choices about what to put in and what to leave out. And indeed, who tells your story can determine whether you are hero or villain, victim or victor—in fact, whether you are remembered at all. Sometimes stories are codified in an attempt to shape identity, to tie everyone into a community through agreement on a shared story. Politicians Read More > |
Parashat Ki Teitzei 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ki Teitzei
By Rabbi Matthew Goldstone
The topics of racism and racial justice have been on many of our minds over the past several months. One particular issue that I have been thinking about is that while many of us might decry racism, we may nevertheless unwittingly be participants in perpetuating policies and practices that reinforce racial inequality. We are not alone in this, nor is it a purely modern phenomenon. Already in the Torah we find judgmental assumptions based upon ancestry rather than individuality.
Our parasha this week delineates several categories of people who are not permitted to enter into the congregation of the Israelites, including the Ammonites and the Moabites. Anyone belonging to these groups is automatically labelled as unacceptable because their ancestors “did not meet you with food and water on your journey after you left Egypt and because they hired Balaam son of Beor, from Pethor Read More >
Parashat Shofetim 5780
The Political Philosophy of Deuteronomy
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shofetim
By Rabbi Len Levin
Rabbi Simeon ben Gamaliel used to say: On three things does the world stand: On justice, on truth and on peace, as it is said: “execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates” (Avot 1:18).
These three principles—truth, justice, and peace—are like three legs of a stool. A three-legged stool is stable, but if any one of the three legs is removed, the stool cannot stand.
There are five laws in the portion Shofetim in which these principles of Rabbi Simeon ben Gamaliel are implied:
- “Justice, justice you shall pursue”—a justice based on truth, without favoritism or bribery (Deuteronomy 16:18–20).
- In matters of legal controversy, there shall be a supreme court to decide the law (Ibid. 17:8–13).
- You may have a king, but he must have his own copy of the Read More >
Parashat Re’eh 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Re’eh
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
“And you will rejoice before the Lord, your God, you and your son and your daughter and your man-servant and your maid-servant and Levite who is within your gates, and the stranger and the orphan and the widow that is among you.” (Deuteronomy 16:11)
I recently asked my teacher, Dr. Victoria Hoffer, why, when she published the first edition of her textbook Biblical Hebrew, she chose the above verse for the cover. She told me that, too often, students come to the study of Hebrew with a kind of grim seriousness. She wanted a verse that expressed the joy of learning and of studying the Bible in its original language.
Knowing that book cover as well as I do, the verse jumped out at me from this week’s parashah, Re’eh. It did so for reasons beyond familiarity; reasons similar to Dr. Hoffer’s. Our parashah too has a Read More >
Parashat Eikev 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Eikev
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
In an episode of the Peanuts comic strip by Charles Schultz, Linus tells his sister Lucy that he wants to be a doctor. She replies in her big-sister way, “You could never be a doctor, you know why? Because you don’t love mankind, that’s why!” To which Linus replies:
This seems to illustrate Moses’ feeling towards the Israelites in Parashat Eikev.
One can’t argue with his commitment to the Israelites as a people (“mankind”), while at the same time we experience his deep frustration with their behavior. As they prepare to enter the Promised Land, Moses’ words include a series of rebukes as he tells them, “You have been rebelling against the Lord since the day I have known you” (Deut. 9:24). He recounts their transgressions in detail – how they built a golden calf idol, and Read More >
Parashat Va’ethanan 5780
The Torah and Quarantine 15
A D’var Torah for Parashat Va’ethanan
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
There is a term associated with the deadly Covid 19, which has been making its way within medical and nutritional circles.
It’s known as Quarantine 15 – referring to the fact that so many Americans have gained weight during the pandemic.
In May, the website WebMD conducted a poll of 900 readers, reporting that 47 percent of Americans had gained between seven and 20 pounds during the first two months of the Covid crisis.
Of those polled, about 72 percent reported they had been exercising less. About 70 per cent stated that they had been “stress eating,” often feeding their anxiety through “comfort foods.”
And this week, the British government launched a program encouraging its citizens to address obesity caused in part by isolation during the pandemic. Laws limiting the advertising of “junk food” are being considered.
What does this have to do with Read More >
Parashat Devarim 5780
Into and Through Tisha b’Av: Our Fragile Alchemy of “Why”
A D’var Torah for Parashat Devarim
By Rabbi David Markus
There’s gotta be a reason. What’s happening now must be a reaction to something that came before. Someone must be responsible: maybe me, maybe you, maybe all of us. Any God that is good and fair must have some purpose in all this – right?
We sense this yearning for “why” just under the surface. After all, there’s lots to explain, and mere natural explanations don’t always suffice. That’s why so many people, of all faiths, might seek and see divine purpose in most everything from covid to tornadoes.
The human psyche – that sacred alchemy of supernal light and stardust – naturally seeks explanation for life’s twists and turns. For every fairness or unfairness, victory or defeat, comfort or suffering, we’re wired to connect the dots of causation with some coherence. If we’re deeply honest, Read More >
Parashat Mattot & Ma’sey 5780
| A D’var Torah for Parashat Mattot By Rabbi Matthew Goldstone Our Torah portion this week teaches us not to promise what we cannot deliver: “If a person makes a vow to the Lord or takes an oath imposing an obligation upon themself, they shall not break the pledge; they must carry out all that crossed their lips” (Num. 30:3). Despite the warning, many people make commitments that they do not end up fulfilling or give assurances for things they never intend to uphold. No wonder there is a strong tradition against taking oaths. We find this attitude in the rabbinic legal tradition when the major 16th century code of law, the Shulhan Arukh, states “Do not be accustomed to making vows and whoever vows – even if they fulfill it – is called a wicked person and is called a sinner” (Yoreh Deah 203:1). And fulfilling an oath might be even Read More > |
Parashat Pinhas 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Pinhas
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
In Parashat Pinhas, five daughters, the daughters of one man, Tzelofhad, appear before Moshe, bringing a case. Their father has died. Each Israelite family is to be allotted land in Canaan when the people enter the land. However, because Tzelofhad has no son, he has not been allotted land. The women present the case that their father deserves a portion in the land: “Let not our father’s name be lost to his clan because he had no son! Give us a holding among our father’s kinsmen!” (Num. 27:4) Moshe brings this case before YHWH, and YHWH declares that “the plea of Tzelofhad’s daughters is just” and rules that if a man has no sons, his daughters may inherit, provided they marry men from within their own tribe (Num. 27:7-11). This caveat about the daughters’ marriage is put in place so that, when the women have Read More >
Parashat Hukkat – Balak 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Hukkat – Balak
By Rabbi Len Levin
We are reading two parshiyot this week, each rich in lessons. We can only present a few hors d’oeuvres here; enjoy the rest at your leisure!
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The ritual of the red heifer raised many puzzles for the rabbis, to the point that they said that the wise king Solomon, frustrated in trying to solve them, gave up in despair and said: “All this I tested with wisdom, I thought I could fathom it, but it eludes me.” (Ecclesiastes 7:23; Pesikta Rabbati 14:1) The central mystery arises from the fact that it is a ritual for purification from contact with death. We are still struggling to understand the causes of death, which even now are evolving and mutating as we try to cope with them. A favorite question was: How is it that the ashes of the heifer are the Read More >
Parashat Korah 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Korah
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
“The Torah of Adonai is perfect, reviving the soul,” reads the psalm (19:8). The word used here for perfection, temimah, implies completeness, but also simplicity, like a platonic ideal – something that exists in our minds but which can only be rendered in flawed representation here on earth. To change something that is perfect is to diminish it. Thus, the idea of perfection in revelation can lead one to a kind of fundamentalism that summarily rejects changes as thwarting, or at least diminishing, God’s will.
Yet, the Torah that is the Book of Numbers challenges this conception of perfection. In last week’s parashah, we learned that the Israelites did not know what to do with one who violated the Sabbath and needed Moses’s intervention to find out (Numbers 15:32-36). In the previous parashah, the Israelites challenged Moses over who was disqualified from offering the Pesach Read More >
Parashat Shelah 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shelah
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
Leaders tend to behave in one of two ways. Some promote fear, often spreading lies which may be based on fears of their own; other leaders promote trust, offering hope for a future envisioned but not yet realized. Parashat Shelah tells the story of what can happen when leadership is fear-based.
It begins as twelve men are selected by Moses to scout out the promised land. These twelve are all machers in the community, one from each of the twelve tribes, whose names and lineage are listed in the text. Their mission is to gather information about the land and its inhabitants. The Torah reading describes how they find huge clusters of grapes, as well as pomegranates and figs – indications of fertile land and good produce. Then we read, “And they returned from searching the land after forty days” (Num. 13:25). There are Read More >
Parashat Beha’alotekha
God Expands the Torah
A D’var Torah for Rarashat Beha’alotekha
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’11)
Can we incorporate within our personal theology a divine and all-knowing God, who agrees to change the laws of Torah upon human request?
It’s an interesting question that emerges both in this week’s Torah portion – Beha’alotekha – (when you light the lamps) and later in the Book of Numbers, where the Daughters of Zelofhad ask God to amend the Torah’s laws surrounding land ownership.
In this week’s parashah, an interesting interaction occurs between Moses and a group of men, who come in contact with a dead body.
According to the Torah, those who become ritually impure (tameh) through contact with a corpse are not permitted to participate in the Passover sacrifice. But, the men want to complete the commandment.
They take their case to Moses: “Impure though we are by reason of a corpse, why must we be debarred from presenting the Lord’s Read More >
Parashat Naso 5780
When It Really Is About The Patriarchy
A D’var Torah for Parshat Naso
By Rabbi David Markus
Dedicated to the family of George Floyd, and peaceful change makers everywhere.
I open this week’s Torah portion (Naso), and I cringe. I read of ancient ways to serve in the Mishkan – all tribal men of a certain age. I read of Sotah trials, humiliating women to placate jealous husbands. Even the Threefold Blessing, phrased free of gender, was harnessed to aim first at Kohanim – only men (B.T. Hullin 49a, Rashi Num. 6:27).
Thankfully we’ve become adept at redeeming Torah from patriarchy. Some see Torah as socially developmental, meeting our ancestors only just a bit ahead of their Bronze Age context so that Torah would be practical. We might note that Torah itself responded to the Sotah trial by restoring an innocent Sotah woman’s power: a false-accuser husband never could divorce her (Deut. 22:19). We Read More >
Shavuot 5780
A D’var Torah for Shavuot
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
Most of us experience moments of transcendence in our lives. A moment of transcendence could be the first moment you realized you were in love with your partner. Or the way you felt at the birth of a child, or the first time you brought home a child you adopted. Perhaps it is a moment of communing with nature—realizing the power and beauty of the ocean, or climbing a mountain, or realizing the vastness of the universe while looking at the moon and the stars. Perhaps it is a religious moment—finding a new truth in the Torah, or suddenly realizing that a prayer speaks directly to you. It could be a big life moment or a small one, but you remember it because it impacted your soul, your spiritual self. It was a connection to something. I would call it a connection to God; Read More >
Parashat Bemidbar 5780
Twelve Tribes Meditation for Parashat Bemidbar
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bemidbar
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
Parashat Bemidbar describes how the twelve tribes encamp around the Tabernacle and the priests: three tribes on each side, with the Levites at the center. This sacred geometry is reminiscent of the months of the year and also of the four directions and seasons—twelve is three times four, a combination of two powerful numbers. One way to take in the Torah of Parashat Bemidbar is to explore the encampment of the twelve tribes through meditation.
Sefer Yetzirah, the Book of Creation, is a Jewish mystical work written between the 6th and 9th century CE. Sefer Yetzirah describes how God uses the Hebrew letters to create the world. Twelve of the letters are associated with twelve human faculties, and also with the twelve months. Later Jewish sources associate each month and faculty with a tribe as well. In one version of the correspondences, offered by translator Aryeh Read More >
Parashat Behar / Behukkotai 5780
Lessons of the Sabbatical for a Time of Pandemic
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bahar / Behukkotai
By Rabbi Len Levin
“Six years you may sow your field…and gather in the yield. But in the seventh year the land shall have a sabbath of complete rest, a sabbath of the Lord…You may eat whatever the land will produce during its sabbath.” (Leviticus 25:3–6)
What is the proper balance of work and rest in the Bible? Can the institutions of the Sabbath and the sabbatical year inspire us with ideas for dealing with the disruption of that balance in the current health crisis?
In the biblical creation story, man and woman were originally put in a garden where they could live off the fruit of the trees that grew naturally. By their sin, they were expelled from this paradise into the real world where people must earn bread by the sweat of their brows ( Read More >
Parashiyot Behar-Behukotai 5780
Lessons of the Sabbatical for a Time of Pandemic
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bahar / Behukkotai
By Rabbi Len Levin
“Six years you may sow your field…and gather in the yield. But in the seventh year the land shall have a sabbath of complete rest, a sabbath of the Lord…You may eat whatever the land will produce during its sabbath.” (Leviticus 25:3–6)
What is the proper balance of work and rest in the Bible? Can the institutions of the Sabbath and the sabbatical year inspire us with ideas for dealing with the disruption of that balance in the current health crisis?
In the biblical creation story, man and woman were originally put in a garden where they could live off the fruit of the trees that grew naturally. By their sin, they were expelled from this paradise into the real world where people must earn bread by the sweat of their brows ( Read More >
Parashat Emor 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Emor
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (AJR ’11)
A well-known midrash tells of Rabbi Yehoshua bemoaning the destruction of the Temple – “the place that atoned for Israel’s sins” – to his master, Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai. Rabbi Yohanan comforts his disciple with the observation that “we have another means of gaining atonement: through deeds of loving kindness, as it is written (Hosea 6:6) ‘I desire deeds of loving kindness, not sacrifice.’” (Avot d’Rabbi Natan 4:5)
Comforting as this midrash might be, it reduces the Temple to a single function: atoning for sin. Yet were this really its primary purpose, why are prayers for the Temple’s restoration so ubiquitous in our liturgy? As one who has ever uttered those prayers with discomfort, I think we need to look more deeply for the answer.
For many of us, our discomfort with the idea of the restoration of the Temple goes beyond our reticence about Read More >
Parashat Aharei Mot Kedoshim
A D’var Torah for Parashat Aharei Mot Kedoshim
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
Parashat Kedoshim consists of a series of commandments which God wants Moses to convey to the Israelite people. As is God’s wont, God has a lot to say as the verses in this parashah jump from one topic to another– keep My sabbaths; when you reap your harvest, leave the corners of your field for the poor and stranger; do not curse the deaf; do not cross-breed your cattle; and so on. These are a few of the laws which appear just in the first two aliyot of the Torah reading. Imagine how the Israelites might have listened to this series of commandments while trying to remember it all; it must have felt overwhelming, and perhaps a bit confusing. What harvest? What stranger?
Then we arrive at the beginning of the third aliyah: “When you come into the land and plant Read More >
Parashat Tazria Metzora 5780
The Torah and Social Distancing
A D’var Torah for Parashat Tazria Metzora
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
Perhaps there has never been a better time to embrace — with open arms — a section of the Torah, which most years we tend to turn away from.
The double portion of Tazria-Metzora speaks about those bodily conditions that often make us socially and physically uncomfortable: Rashes, skin diseases, bodily purification and leprosy, to name a few.
But isn’t it remarkable, how, in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, this week’s Parashah comes to life probably in a way it never has in our lifetime?
During this unprecedented time, we can’t help but marvel at how our tradition appeared concerned with public health, long before the field of medicine became a sophisticated practice.
Indeed, our tradition recognizes the importance of testing, treatment, quarantine, evaluation and re-integration as part of a communal approach to healing.
During this time of quarantine and social distancing, the Read More >
Parashat Shemini 5780
“Silent” Tribute to the Dead of Covid-19
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shemini
By Rabbi David Markus
Spiritually speaking, what should we say amidst 120,000 covid-19 deaths? Surely there must be something we should say, some right response – right?
If these questions land a gut punch, if they rouse gnawing emptiness, if they jumble emotions and singe the soul, then we might just barely begin to imagine Aaron in this week’s paresha (Shemini). How could the High Priest of Israel lose his sons Nadav and Avihu to divine fire, and then respond with silence – vayidom Aharon (Leviticus 10:3)?
This timely question, about one of Torah’s most difficult texts, touches our core both as individuals and as spiritual leaders – especially now.
But let’s be clear: our question’s covid-19 context isn’t so unusual in a global sense. According to the United Nations, over 165,000 people die every day from all causes (e.g. age, illnesses both acute and Read More >
Pesah 5780
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Parashat Tzav 5780
An Offering of the heart
A D’var Torah for Parashat Tzav
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
Parashat Tzav deals with the offerings that the priests and the people made in the Tabernacle for the purposes of gratitude, atonement, and daily celebration. These offerings included the olah (an offering entirely burnt), the minhah or meal-offering, the zevah shelamim—a celebratory offering where part was given to God and people ate the rest—and the hatat and asham, two kinds of sin offerings. This week, my attention was particularly drawn to the olah, the offering that is completely burned. I want to explore three ways the olah might be relevant to us at this moment.
First, to me, the olah offering, an offering that is entirely given over, speaks to the powerful offerings that doctors, nurses, midwives, EMTs, and other medical workers are making right now as they serve those who are ill even at risk to themselves. This offering speaks, to me, of the Read More >
Parashat Vayikra 5780
The Teachings of Leviticus for This Present Moment
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayikra
By Rabbi Len Levin
This week we begin reading the book of Leviticus. The interpretation I offer here has benefited from the perspectives of the contemporary scholars Mary Douglas (Purity and Danger) and Jacob Milgrom (The Anchor Bible: Leviticus), both of whom have enriched my understanding of the author’s complex outlook.
The underlying unity of the book’s diverse themes can be seen in the theme of purification—purification through ritual (especially sacrifices—chapters 1–10 and dietary laws—chapter 11), purification through medical diagnosis and quarantine (the laws of leprosy and family purity—chapters 12–15), and purification through ethical living and social justice (the teaching of “love your neighbor” (Lev. 19:18) and the Sabbatical / Jubilee years—chapter 25). In the book’s coda (chapter 26), the author promises peace and prosperity if these teachings are taken to heart in the life of Read More >
Parashat Vayak’hel / P’kudei 5780
| A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayak’hel P’kudei By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)What does it mean to have a “willing heart?” The phrase is used three times in the opening verses of this week’s parashah, Vayak’hel/P’kudei (Exodus 35:5, 22, and 29). It likewise appears in Parashat Terumah, Exodus 25:2. In each instance the circumstances are the same; it describes the voluntary donations of precious materials (gold, silver, jewels, rare fabrics) used for the construction of the Mishkan – God’s dwelling place among the Israelite tribes. These donations are all made by those whose heart moves them to do so, and they are made in such profusion that Moses ultimately must command the Israelites to stop (Exodus 36:6). But we only realize how evocative is the phrase “willing heart” when we consider the source of these gifts. These materials were acquired by the Israelites as they left Egypt, stripping it of its precious objects as Read More > |
Parashat Ki Tisa 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ki Tisa
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
In Parashat Ki Tisa Aaron has been left in charge of the Israelites while Moses is meeting with God atop Mount Sinai. As the brother of Moses, Aaron is a likely choice to be given the responsibility of interim-leader. Given what happens however, one might wonder if he was the right person for the job.
Time passes, Moses doesn’t return, God is silent, the Israelites become anxious. In Exodus 32:1 we read, “The people gathered against Aaron and said to him, come, make us a god who shall go before us, for that man Moses… we do not know what has happened to him.” Aaron immediately complies. He doesn’t try to convince the people that Moses will be back soon, or encourage them to keep faith with God. Rather, he asks for the gold from the jewelry of their wives and daughters, and uses it Read More >
Parashat Tetzaveh 5780
Purim: When Israel truly accepted Torah
A D’var Torah for Parashat Tetzaveh
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
One of the visual highlights of the regular Shabbat service occurs after we complete our weekly Torah reading.
Within the Asheknazi (European) tradition, the magbiah (the lifter) opens the Torah at least three columns wide, and raises it towards the heavens. The congregation responds by chanting, “And this is the Torah that Moses set before the people of Israel — upon the command of God, through Moses’ hand” (Deut. 4:44)
It is a beautiful tradition which acknowledges the Jewish people receiving Torah at Mount Sinai, more than three thousand years ago.
But as our Talmudic tradition teaches, receipt of Torah is one thing, accepting it is another.
The Talmud implies, that in the desert, barely three months after their liberation, the Israelites really had no choice. They were totally dependent on God.
Supplies of food and water were limited. They were at Read More >
Parashat Terumah 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Terumah
By Rabbi David Markus
By Rabbi David Markus
Sometimes it’s what Torah doesn’t say. Listen to Torah’s silence and she might reveal whole new worlds just waiting for you to hear them into being.
With this week’s Parashat Terumah, Torah begins describing how Moses, Betzalel and their team will build the Mishkan. Chapter after detailed chapter, Torah specifies the metals, fabrics, dimensions, shapes, colors and vessels of the Indwelling Place in which our wandering ancestors would channel and receive the sacred. Torah’s architectural design and building instructions were explicit, nuanced and exacting…
… except for the two kruvim adorning the Holy of Holies. It’s easy, God says: just pop ’em on top.
“Make two kruvim of gold, make them of hammered work, at the two ends of the cover. Make one kruv on one end, and one kruv on the other end…. The kruvim will stretch their wings above, covering the [Ark’s] cover with their wings, and each face will front the other…. Read More >
Parashat Mishpatim 5780
Knowing What We Don’t Know
A D’var Torah for Parashat Mishpatim
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
A D’var Torah for Parashat Mishpatim
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
Parashat Mishpatim deals, among many other matters, with the laws of robbery. Exodus 22:1-2, which is part of the larger discussion of robbery, reads: “If one finds someone who comes through a tunnel [into one’s house], and one strikes them and they are killed, one is not liable for bloodguilt [murder]. But if the sun shone upon them, there is bloodguilt [it is murder if one kills them]…” When I was in rabbinical school, in one of my Talmud classes, we studied a section (sugya) of the Talmud known as “haba b’mahteret” or “one who comes through a tunnel.” (Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 72a)—which comments on these verses. The sugya offers three possible interpretations of this verse, which invite us to contemplate how we judge others we fear.
The text considers the possibility that, as safe as we Read More >
Parashat Yitro 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Yitro
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
This week’s Torah portion includes the single most intense episode in the whole Torah—the revelation of Torah at Mount Sinai. The Israelites, having left Egypt, stand together at the foot of the mountain. There’s thunder and lightning, and the blaring of a horn. The mountain is shaking and smoking, because God has come down on it in fire. This is when the Israelites really become a people, God’s people—when God gives them the Torah.
We don’t call this Torah portion “revelation,” though. And we don’t call it “the 10 Commandments.” The name we use for this Torah portion is Yitro, because the portion begins with something else, something that is also very important, though more mundane.
At the beginning of parashat Yitro, Moses and the Israelites are encamped at Mount Sinai. Moses’s father-in-law, Jethro—Yitro in Hebrew—comes to visit. Jethro and Moses have a nice visit and catch up on Read More >
Parashat Beshalah 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Beshalah
By Rabbi Len Levin
This week’s joyful song at the crossing of the Sea is ensconced in the daily liturgy, morning and evening: “Who is like You, O Lord, among the celestials; who is like You, majestic in holiness, awesome in splendor, working wonders!” (Exod. 15:11) Thus the liturgy utters three ringing declarations about God: God creates, God reveals Torah in love, God redeems.
A naïve understanding would have it that God is active and we are passive in these three actions. But a more sophisticated approach asks: Does God act unilaterally? Can anything happen in human history without human participation and cooperation?
Two weeks ago, God promised: Ve-hotzeiti etkhem—“I will bring you out” (Exod. 6:6). In his liturgical poem Kehosha’ta Elim accompanying the Sukkot lulav processional, the 7th-century poet Eleazar Kalir read this verse ve-hutzeiti itkhem—“I will be brought out with you.” Abraham Read More >
Parashat Bo 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bo
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
“This month shall mark for you the beginning of the months.” (Exodus 12:2) This has to be one of the most jarring verses in all of Torah. After eleven uninterrupted chapters of perhaps the most dramatic story ever told – the conflict between Moses and Pharaoh – we find ourselves in what quickly becomes a detailed discussion of the observance of the festival of Pesah. Gone is the ratcheting tension of human obstinacy in the face of divine wrath and in its place, twenty-eight verses of calendars, cooking instructions and details for future observances.
And yet, in this mass of interrupting detail, I find the answer to what I consider a particularly troubling verse in this week’s parashah, Bo. It too concerns the celebration of a festival. Faced with yet another plague, Pharaoh asks Moses who among the Israelites will depart with him should he be allowed Read More >
Parashat Va’era 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Va’era
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
Parashat Va’era begins with a continuation of the interaction between God and Moses from last week’s parasha. This week’s conversation seems to be a “do-over”, perhaps the result of God’s recognition that the relationship with Moses is going to be quite different from the earlier relationships between God and the Genesis patriarchs.
When God first appeared to Abraham (then called Avram) in the book of Genesis, God commanded him, “Go forth from your land and from your birthplace…to the land that I will show you. And I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you…” The response was direct and immediate: “So Avram departed” (Gen 12:1-4).
Moses is no Abraham. Last week when Moses first encountered God at the burning bush, he was far more reluctant to follow God’s instructions. After the introductory “I am the God of your father, the Read More >
Parashat Shemot 5780
Antisemitism Then and Now
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shemot
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
There is a gnawing question that has plagued many commentators, as we witness in this week’s Torah portion, what could be referred to as the first recorded case of antisemitism:
How did the Jewish people fall from grace to disgrace in such a relatively short period of time?
More specifically, what exactly happened during the two hundred years since the Israelites were welcomed into Egypt with open arms – to the point when a new Pharaoh arose and enacted policies that targeted the descendants of Joseph?
As last week’s Parashah ended, all appeared to be well between the Israelites and the Egyptians. The Torah tells us that officials from the highest levels of the Egyptian government accompanied Joseph as he travelled to Canaan to bury his father, Jacob.
This included, “…all the officials of Pharaoh, the senior members of the court, and all of Egypt’s Read More >
Parashat Vayehi 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayehi
By Rabbi David Markus
This last Torah portion of the Book of Genesis (Vayeḥi) concludes the drama of Jacob, Joseph and his brothers. The dramatic saga – their troubled family dynamics, power and power inversions, regret, guilt, fear, their very lives – it all finally reaches a settled tableau. Jacob is buried, hatchets are buried (maybe), and Joseph’s body is embalmed. With them, Torah’s first era of Jewish ancestry ends.
Of course, their deaths are Torah’s fertilizer for the future. Reflecting God’s promise to Abraham long before (Gen. 15:13), by design all of this week’s endings are mere prelude. The next chapter soon will open by recounting those generations (Ex. 1:1-6), and a new king of Egypt will rise to life who knows not Joseph (Ex. 1:8). Centuries of bondage will commingle death and life until only supernatural deaths – the Tenth Plague and the drowning Read More >
Parashat Vayigash 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayigash
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover
In this week’s Torah portion, Vayigash, Joseph reveals who he is to his brothers, in an awkward and fraught family reunion. It could hardly be otherwise. His brothers, when they were more powerful than Joseph due to age and numbers, sold him into slavery years ago and let their father believe his favorite son was dead. Now, he is the powerful one—the Egyptian official second only to Pharaoh—and they have come begging to buy food in the famine.
They never had much in common with each other, Joseph and his brothers, and they never got along. Joseph insulted his brothers and reported on their behavior to their father. They, of course, rejected him in the most extreme way, just short of murdering him.
Still, the bond of family remains. Times are hard now, during this great famine. Joseph forgives his brothers and helps them, because they Read More >
Parashat Miketz 5780
The Dreams of Pharaoh
A D’var Torah for Parashat Miketz
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
Often when we come to this parashah, we think of the drama of Yosef: his rediscovery of his brothers and his decision to trick them in order to see if their character has changed. But this year, I am finding myself curious about a different drama: the story of Pharaoh. Not the one with a hard heart, but the first Pharaoh, the one who dreams. It is this Pharaoh who elevates Joseph to high estate. It is also this Pharaoh who teaches us something about the qualities of leadership.
At the beginning of Genesis 41, the Pharaoh of Egypt has two dreams in a single night, dreams that disturb him. In the first dream, seven healthy cows come out of the Nile, and then seven emaciated cows come out and devour the seven healthy cows. In the second, Pharaoh sees a grain stalk with seven healthy Read More >
Parashat Vayeshev 5780
Thomas Mann’s Portrayal of Tamar—A Self-Reflection?
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayeshev
By Rabbi Len Levin
I first encountered Thomas Mann’s portrayal of the biblical heroine Tamar (from Joseph and His Brothers, pp. 1016–42) as a high school student; it was assigned reading in our Jewish day school. I have never been able to see her otherwise since.
Thomas Mann was arguably the greatest German writer of his age. He worked on his massive fictional rendition of the Joseph saga from 1924 to 1942, years of turbulence and tragedy for Germany and Jewry. He modeled his portrayal of Rachel on his wife Katia, who came from an assimilated German Jewish family. Seeking a leading female character for the fourth part of his tetralogy, he chose Tamar, daughter-in-law of Judah who became the progenitress of the two leading clans of the Judah tribe, Peretz and Zerah, and ancestress of the Davidic dynasty.
Mann masterfully reworks the bare bones Read More >
Parashat Vayeishev 5780
Thomas Mann’s Portrayal of Tamar—A Self-Reflection?
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayeshev
By Rabbi Len Levin
I first encountered Thomas Mann’s portrayal of the biblical heroine Tamar (from Joseph and His Brothers, pp. 1016–42) as a high school student; it was assigned reading in our Jewish day school. I have never been able to see her otherwise since.
Thomas Mann was arguably the greatest German writer of his age. He worked on his massive fictional rendition of the Joseph saga from 1924 to 1942, years of turbulence and tragedy for Germany and Jewry. He modeled his portrayal of Rachel on his wife Katia, who came from an assimilated German Jewish family. Seeking a leading female character for the fourth part of his tetralogy, he chose Tamar, daughter-in-law of Judah who became the progenitress of the two leading clans of the Judah tribe, Peretz and Zerah, and ancestress of the Davidic dynasty.
Mann masterfully reworks the bare bones Read More >
Parashat Vayishlah 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayishlah
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
Two recent experiences color my reading of this week’s parashah, Vayishlah. The first involved my family watching When Harry Met Sally for the umpteenth time. After the movie, we turned to the DVD’s special features which included an interview with the screenwriter, the wonderful Nora Ephron. In it she said that there were two kinds of romantic comedies. In the Christian kind, the protagonists are kept apart by a real, physical barrier. In the Jewish kind, they are separated by the man’s neuroses.
I thought about that as I read of Jacob’s preparations to meet his brother Esau at the beginning of this week’s parashah. First he sends an obsequious message to Esau hoping for a favorable reply (Gen. 32:4-6). When that fails, he divides his camp in two, seeking to secure the safety of at least part of his clan (Gen. 32:8-9). Then he sends gifts to his brother, Read More >
Parashat Vayetze 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayetze
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
Our liturgy contains frequent reminders that our God is also the God of the three patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But from what we know about Jacob when we encounter him at the beginning of Parashat Vayetze, he seems like a poor choice for a patriarch. He had behaved terribly towards his brother and father, having manipulated Esau into giving him the older brother’s birthright and then deceiving his father Isaac into giving him the blessing meant for Esau. Jacob is forced to leave home in order to escape Esau’s death threats.
Granted, Jacob’s role had been preordained when they were in the womb, as it was declared that the elder of the twins, Esau, would serve the younger, Jacob (Genesis 25:23). Nonetheless, Jacob’s behavior thus far does not seem consistent with the actions of one worthy of God’s blessing.
Parashat Vayetze begins pursuant to these Read More >
Parashat Vayeitzei 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayetze
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
Our liturgy contains frequent reminders that our God is also the God of the three patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But from what we know about Jacob when we encounter him at the beginning of Parashat Vayetze, he seems like a poor choice for a patriarch. He had behaved terribly towards his brother and father, having manipulated Esau into giving him the older brother’s birthright and then deceiving his father Isaac into giving him the blessing meant for Esau. Jacob is forced to leave home in order to escape Esau’s death threats.
Granted, Jacob’s role had been preordained when they were in the womb, as it was declared that the elder of the twins, Esau, would serve the younger, Jacob (Genesis 25:23). Nonetheless, Jacob’s behavior thus far does not seem consistent with the actions of one worthy of God’s blessing.
Parashat Vayetze begins pursuant to these Read More >
Parashat Toledot 5780
| Our “Imperfect” Biblical Characters A D’var Torah for Parashat Toledot By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10) Rabbi Joseph Ehrenkranz, one of my most influential teachers, once shared a profound insight with me regarding why he believed the Torah is based on truth. “The characters we read about are so flawed,” he said. “While the heroes of many other religions are depicted as perfect, ours are not. There is no reason to describe them this way, unless it is to touch on the truth within each of us.” This week’s Torah portion, Toledot (“This is the story of Isaac”), is a case in point. It recounts the story of a dysfunctional family worthy of a reality television series. After twenty childless years, Rebecca conceives twins. The Torah describes Rebecca’s difficult pregnancy, as her two future sons “struggle inside her.” God describes “two nations in your womb,” and—as often is the case in the Torah— “the elder will serve the younger.” ( Read More > |
Parashat Hayei Sarah
| A D’var Torah for Parashat Hayei Sarah By Rabbi David Markus I stopped counting how often I hear, “God loves me: I got a great parking spot.” Even some clergy, spiritual directors and theologians have a soft spot for the Angel of Miraculous Parking. I too admit to invoking Hanayat-El (from hanayah / ”parking”) under my breath. Perhaps it’s a cute half-joke – seemingly easy and low stakes, gently cutting down to size the vast uncontrollability of modern life. And as spiritual thinkers of integrity and rigor, let’s be candid about the many theological dilemmas of Hanayat-El: Why do bad parking spots happen to good people? Isn’t God close to the broken-hearted driver on a hurried errand? Does God do parking but not highway traffic or airport delays? Vanity of vanities: all parking is vanity! But Hanayat-El is no joke. Angel of Miraculous Parking or not, intercessory prayer – asking God for specifics – is a core Jewish Read More > |
Parashat Vayeira 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayeira
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
At the beginning of this week’s Torah portion, Vayeira, Abraham is sitting outside his tent at the hottest part of the day. God visits him. Our rabbis tell us that this is an act of compassion on God’s part. The reason Abraham is sitting isn’t just that it’s the hottest part of the day—too hot to work or do anything, really—but also because he’s recovering from having circumcised himself, as God had commanded him to do at the end of last week’s Torah portion.
This is where we derive the duty to visit the sick—we are emulating God, who visits Abraham when he is recovering from surgery. God, who is so much more important than Abraham, takes the time to come see him when he isn’t feeling well.
And look at the effect it has on Abraham, who must be toward the end of his Read More >
Parashat Lekh Lekha 5780
Is Not the Whole Land Before You?
A D’var Torah for Parashat Lekh Lekha
By Rabbi Jill Hammer, PhD
Every year on Simhat Torah, in my home community of Romemu, we unroll the entire Torah and the whole community holds it in a circle. Everyone present receives a biblical verse for the year. Most people draw a verse from a basket with many biblical verses on slips of paper. Some of us like to do it the “old-fashioned way”: by closing our eyes and pointing to the scroll. That’s what I did this year, and my finger landed on this passage:
“Avram said to Lot, “Let there not be a quarrel between me and you, between my shepherds and yours, for we are relatives (anashim ahim). Is not the whole land (kol ha’aretz) before you? Please separate from me. If you go left, I will go right, and if you go right, I will go left.” (Gen 13:8-9)
It seemed an ominous passage Read More >
Parashat Noah 5780
Deluge, Ancient and Modern
A D’var Torah for Parashat Noah
By Rabbi Len Levin
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and all their host. God saw everything that God made, that it was good. All the beings and creatures followed the innate laws of their being, as implanted in them by their creator. Everything was perfectly orderly and predictable.
Then God created human beings and granted them free will. All hell broke loose, and all bets were off.
Corruption spread from humans to all God’s creation. The world was reverting to chaos faster than God could catch the divine breath that was hovering over the waters. God resolved to wipe out the entirety of earthly creation, except for a few specimens from each species that God’s chosen human representative Noah would salvage in order to start over.
After the deluge, God considered what changes to institute to give things a better chance the next Read More >
Parashat Bereishit 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bereishit
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
For many years now, I have been intrigued by one particular reading in my synagogue’s High Holiday mahzor (Mahzor Hadash, The Prayer Book Press). Entitled “Continuing Creation,” it says that “our Sages taught, the human being is ‘God’s partner in the work of Creation.’ God and we create together.” It goes on to say: “There is still much to be done: disease to be conquered, injustice and poverty to overcome, hatred and war to be eliminated. There is truth to be discovered, beauty to be fashioned, freedom to be achieved, peace and righteousness to be established.”
This reading’s appeal rests on its nobility: lofty, even holy goals that become the mission toward which we work. In positing us as God’s partners in the work of Creation, this passage invests our lives with a transcendent purpose and significance.
But what exactly does it mean to say that we are God’s Read More >
Parashat Ha’azinu 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ha’azinu
By Rabbi Isaac Mann
Moses’ final message to the assembled Israelite people came in the form of a poetic song (shirah) that described in brief the spiritual history of their relationship with the Almighty. As with all poetry, what appears to be a simple, readily understood expression can upon careful examination actually contain layers of deeper meaning. One such verse is the following (Deut. 32:6):
“Do you thus requite the Lord, O vile people and unwise (am naval ve’lo hakham)? Is He not your father who has created you, who fashioned you and made you endure?”
The word naval, which is found only twice in the Pentateuch (in this verse and again a few verses later, in v. 21), denotes a person or a nation that repays its benefactor with evil. It is used most famously to refer to the husband of Avigail in the Book of Samuel Read More >
Parashat Vayeilekh 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayeilekh
By Rabbi David Markus
Rosh Hashanah brings a spiritual lag between the year’s reboot and Torah’s reboot, like our northern latitude’s seasonal lag between sun angle and temperature. This spiritual lag raises two questions. First, shouldn’t Rosh Hashanah, which recalls the Yom Harat Olam (Creation’s birthday) of Genesis 1, therefore also be Simhat Torah to reboot the Torah cycle at the same time? Second, precisely because Simhat Torah lags behind by over three weeks, what spiritual meaning to make of this lag and this week’s Torah portion (Vayeilekh) that begins to fill it?
Talmud’s explanation for the lag is that Rosh Hashanah should follow only after we read Torah’s “curses” of consequence for disobedience (Megillah 31b). That’s Deuteronomic theology in a nutshell: spiritually speaking, we get what we deserve and we deserve what we get.
To me, Talmud’s premise doesn’t hold. Even if we accept Deuteronomic theology Read More >
Parashat Nitzavim 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Nitzavim
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
In this week’s Torah portion, Nitzavim, Moses speaks to the Israelites of the covenant between them and God. He emphasizes that every person in their society is a party to the covenant. Interestingly and perhaps incredibly, the non-Israelites who live among the Israelites are included as part of the covenant. We read repeatedly in the Torah that there is to be one law for the Israelite and the foreigner who lives among the Israelites, but usually it is not as clear that those foreigners are actually party to the covenant with God. But they are.
Moses says, “You stand this day, all of you, before the Eternal your God—your tribal heads, your elders, and your officials, all the men of Israel, your children, your women, even the stranger within your camp, from woodchopper to water drawer—to enter into the covenant of the Eternal your Read More >
Parashat Ki Tavo 5779
Coming of the Messiah: Sooner or Later?
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ki Tavo
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
Perhaps no Jewish themed text has been more quoted in recent times than the 1971 theater production, Fiddler on the Roof.
In one of Fiddler’s closing scenes, as residents of the fictional town of Anatevka continue packing their belongings, one of the local characters, Mottel the Tailor, turns to the community’s rabbi and asks:
“Rabbi, we’ve been waiting for the Messiah all our lives. Wouldn’t now be a good time for him to come?”
To which the Rabbi replies: “I guess we’ll have to wait someplace else.”
The idea of a great national savior to either facilitate or preside over a perfected world has captured the imagination of Jews, among others, for centuries.
Allusions to this character appear in many prophetic books, most notably Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Micah, Hosea, Zachariah and Daniel.
As hardships continued to besiege the Jewish people over the Read More >
Parashat Ki Tetzei 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ki Tetzei
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
As a rabbinical student, I attended a lecture taught by a sofer – a scribe – who demonstrated for us some of the tools he used in creating a Torah scroll. Among them was a sheet of parchment covered with ink blotches. The scribe showed us how, before beginning to work on the scroll, he would inscribe the name Amalek on this sheet and then blot it out. Thus did he honor (if not exactly fulfill) the commandments in this week’s Torah portion to both remember Amalek and erase the memory of him (Deuteronomy 25:17-19).
This exercise strikes me as a clever if incomplete way of dealing with apparently contradictory commandments. There are other places in Deuteronomy where we are asked to reconcile commandments or statements that are at odds with each other. Notably, two weeks ago, in Parashat Re’eh, we read first that “there shall be Read More >
Parashat Shoftim 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shoftim
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
“Return to Me”. As I was folding my food-delivery bag I saw those printed words on the bottom. The actual words were “Return Me” (a message for the sake of sustainability) but that’s not what I saw; the mind is a funny thing sometimes. We are in the month of Elul, countdown to the High Holidays. Return to Me! Return to the One in Whose Guidance we trust; return to me, my most sacred authentic self. There are many ways to approach this period of preparation and personal reflection prior to the Days of Awe; a theme from Parashat Shoftim suggests one framework: that theme is justice.
This week’s Torah reading begins with God’s establishment of a legal structure, for the time when the Israelites will dwell in their new home across the Jordan. Judges and law enforcement officials are to be established in all the tribes, and Read More >
Parashat Re’eh 5779
There Never Was an Idolatrous City
A D’var Torah for Parashat Re’eh
By Rabbi Len Levin
“See, this day I set before you blessing and curse.” (Deut. 11:26)
“I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life!” (Deut. 30:19)
It should be so simple. But life is rarely that simple.
The extreme of evil, which the Torah bids us shun, is idolatry (Deut. 13:2–19). What is idolatry? In rabbinic literature, idolatry is often equated with kafar ba-ikar —forsaking the fundamental principle of Judaism. In modern parlance, we have other ways of expressing supreme condemnation. “Disloyalty,” “treason,” and “self-hating Jew” come to mind. They carry the same valence of scorn, ostracism, and exclusion as “idolatry” in ancient discourse. Each is used implicitly to condemn an opponent as violating the fundamental principle of Judaism.
But there is more than one fundamental principle of Judaism.
In the Pesah Haggadah, we are told Read More >
Parashat Eikev 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Eikev
By Rabbi Isaac Mann
In the beginning of this week’s Torah reading we have two references to the manna (man in Hebrew) that sustained the Israelites in the desert for forty years as a test (nisayon) by God. In this essay I wish to explore what was the nature of this test and how it relates to us in practical terms.
In his long exhortation to B’nei Yisrael, Moses reminds them that God had them travel in the wilderness for the past forty years that “He might test you by hardships to learn what was in your hearts: whether you would keep His commandments or not. He subjected you to the hardship of hunger and then gave you manna to eat … in order to teach you that man does not live by bread alone, but that man may live on anything that the Lord decrees” (Deut. 8:2-3). Read More >
Parashat Va’ethanan 5779
| A D’var Torah for Parashat Va’ethanan By Rabbi David Markus It’s fitting that the “Jewish greatest hits” of Parashat Va’ethanan come immediately after Tisha b’Av. After our spiritual calendar’s lowest day, Torah promises that anyone who seeks God with whole heart and soul will find God exactly where we are – even in exile (Deut. 4:27-29). We stand again to hear the sacred utterances we call the Ten Commandments, recalling that together we stood at Sinai (Deut. 5:6-18). We receive the Shema of unity and the V’ahavta of a love that far transcends place – both “dwelling in [our] home and walking on [our] way” (Deut. 6:4-9). Notice how the three Va’ethanan dimensions of content, place and time commingle spiritually. The content is core Jewish theology. It’s our full-hearted search for God amidst a promise of real sacred encounter. (Heschel’s God in Search of Man, anyone?) It’s God pouring Self into Word becoming Read More > |
Parashat Devarim 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Devarim
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
Devarim is the first significant word of this week’s Torah portion, and therefore it gives the Torah portion its name. Because this week is the first portion in the fifth book of the Torah, Devarim is also the name of the whole book, which is called Deuteronomy in English, from the Greek. Devarim means “words,” and it’s an appropriate name for the book, because Moses spends the whole book of Deuteronomy making his last speech to the Israelites. At the end of it he dies and they prepare to go forward into the Promised Land.
In Judaism, words are very important. We are called the “People of the Book”—a book (books, really) full of words that give us the best information we have about what God wants from us. Words can create and destroy reputations. According to our tradition, God used words to create Read More >
Parashat Matot-Masei 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Matot-Masei
By Rabbi Jill Hammer, PhD
This week we have a double parashah: Matot-Masei. The name of Parashat Matot means staffs (as in big sticks). A staff is a sign of authority, and this parashah is full of reflections on tribal and patriarchal authority. As it moves through its various narratives, the parashah demonstrates how small acts of violence can lead to larger ones.
The parashah opens with an explanation of the practice of nedarim or vows. This was an important Israelite practice that was open to laypeople, not only clergy. The making and keeping of a vow—such as a vow to become a nazirite and not cut your hair, or Hannah’s vow to give Samuel to the Temple—was a kind of offering practice. It was a way of showing devotion to God and often of showing gratitude for some personal abundance or miraculous intervention one had received.
However, this vowing practice was not equally open to Read More >
Parashat Pinhas 5779
Pinhas: Hero or vigilante?
A D’var Torah for Parashat Pinhas
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
It may be strongly argued that within Judaism, there is no room or tolerance for committing murder in God’s name.
We view with distain fanatical groups such as ISIS or Boko Haran killing others for failing to adhere to a specific type of religious practice. Teenage girls have been kidnapped or enslaved for the perceived crime of receiving an education.
Within Judaism, we have witnessed in recent years numerous examples of religious zealotry – including the murder of Muslims in Hebron in 1995, or the stabbings at the 2005 Jerusalem gay pride parade, or the assassination in 1995 of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.
All of this has been universally condemned by the modern Jewish world.
So then, how can we embrace the text to be read this Saturday in synagogues throughout the world – named after Pinhas, grandson of Aaron the priest, Read More >
Parashat Balak 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Balak
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
My family has a habit of frequenting struggling restaurants, which means we often wind up befriending their owners. And, given my limited menu choices, those owners usually soon discover that we are Jewish. One night, many years ago, my wife was talking to one of these owners about the difficulties she was facing in her own business. To which the struggling restaurateur replied “Oh, you don’t have to worry. You’re Jewish and God doesn’t let Jewish businesses fail.”
This week’s Torah portion and its story of Balaam, the heathen prophet hired by Moabite king Balak to curse Israel, brought that evening at that long since shuttered restaurant to mind. Having twice failed in his mission, we are told that Balaam turns his gaze to the wilderness where he lifts his eyes and sees Israel “encamped tribe by tribe.” (Numbers, 24:2) The vision evokes from Read More >
Parashat Hukkat 5779
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Parashat Korah 5779
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Parashat Shelah Lekha 5779
Grasshoppers and Giants
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shelah Lekha
By Rabbi Matthew Goldstone
Parashat Shelah Lekha recounts the episode of the twelve spies who travel ahead to scout out the Promised Land. Ten of the spies return to the people with a report of the wonderful fruit of the land coupled with the overwhelming danger of its inhabitants. Not only do these ten spies describe the people of this place as gigantic (אַנְשֵׁי מִדּוֹת), but these scouts convey their own depiction of how these people perceived the intruders – “And we looked like grasshoppers (חֲגָבִים) to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them” (Num. 13:33). Their report strikes fear into the hearts of the Israelites who regret leaving Egypt and God gets angry.
Readers often assume that the sin of the ten spies, and the reason for God’s anger, is that they suggest that the people of the land are too Read More >
Parashat Beha’alotekha 5779
Lighting Us Up: Theology, Pluralism and Becoming the Menorah
A D’var Torah for Parashat Beha’alotekha
By Rabbi David Markus
What does God need of our spirituality, what do we need of it, and how do we know? These questions cast long theological shadows across sacred tradition, and efforts at clarity often generate more heat than light.
It’s with those questions in mind that I read of Parashat Beha’alotekha’s seven-branch gold menorah, symbol of Jewish peoplehood and the modern State of Israel.
Why seven branches? The parashah doesn’t say. God just tells Moses to instruct Aaron: “In your lifting the lamps (beha’alotekha et ha-neirot) to light, let seven lamps shine at the front of the menorah” (Numbers 8:2). The fact of the menorah’s “seven” is assumed.
Torah continues that the menorah should look as previously described – alluding to the design God showed Moses at Sinai (Exodus 25:40). There too, however, Torah doesn’t say why seven branches.
Do the Read More >
Parashat Naso 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Naso
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
Last week’s Torah portion, Bemidbar, started with a lot of counting of Israelites. This week’s Torah portion, Naso, also begins with counting. The word “Naso” means “take up,” as in “Take up a census of the Gershonites also” (Numbers 4:22). The counting in this Torah portion is of different clans of the Levites who have responsibilities to pack up and transport different parts of the Tabernacle when the Israelites decamp and move on through the wilderness.
We are told the final counts: There are 2,750 Kohathites between the ages of 30 and 50—which are the years when the Levites are responsible for the work of the Tabernacle; there are 2,630 Gershonites; and there are 3,200 Merarites, for a total of 8,580 Levites. This seems like rather a lot of people for the task of packing and moving the Tabernacle around, but the Torah Read More >
Parashat Bemidbar 5779
The “New” Tribes of Israel
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bemidbar
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
Over the centuries, there has been much debate and speculation regarding the fate of the twelve tribes of Israel.
In recent years, with the advent of such genealogy programs as Ancestry.com and 23andMe, there has been considerable interest within the Jewish world and beyond in tracing our roots and countries of origin.
Yet, in spite of this new technology, few of us, with the exception of the Kohanim and Levi’im, know which tribe we descend from.
But, can we truly say, in 2019, that the idea of tribalism within Judaism is passé? Perhaps not.
In Biblical times, each Israelite knew where they came from. Each tribe has its own banner. Each tribe had its own personality. In the closing portion of the Book of Genesis, in his last days, Jacob gathers his twelve sons, and gives each tribe its own blessing according to that personality. Read More >
Parashat Behukkotai 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Behukkotai
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
Reading this week’s Torah portion, I found myself as influenced by what is not in it as what is. What is not in it are the opening words “And God spoke to Moses, saying …” Those words, ubiquitous throughout the middle books of the Torah (they do appear half-way through this week’s parashah), do more than testify to the provenance of the revelation that follows them. They also create a distance between ourselves and those words by letting us know that we are hearing them, not directly, but as transmitted through an intermediary.
The “And God spoke to Moses” to which the opening words of this week’s parashah do not attach, appear all the way at the beginning of last week’s parashah. Even when these two parashiyot are read together, 56 verses separate us from the last mention of Moses’s mediating role. As a result, for me Read More >
Parashat Behar – 5779
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Parashat Emor – 5779
Kedushah: From Hierarchy to Complementarity
A D’var Torah for Parashat Emor
By Rabbi Len Levin
“[The priests] shall be holy to their God and not profane the name of their God; for they offer the Lord’s offerings by fire…and so must be holy” (Leviticus 21:6).
“These are My fixed times, the fixed times of the LORD, which you shall proclaim as sacred occasions” (Leviticus 23:2).
“The world stands on three things: on Torah, on the [Temple] service, and on deeds of lovingkindness” (Avot 1:2).
“A bastard who is a scholar takes precedence over a High Priest who is an ignoramus” (Mishnah Horayot 3:8).
“Holiness determines and actualizes the spirit as moral spirit. And in the same way the spirit determines and actualizes holiness as the action of moral reason” (Hermann Cohen, Religion of Reason out of the Sources of Judaism, end of Chapter 7).
Can sanctity be reconciled with equality?
Kedushah—holiness or sanctity—is one of Read More >
Parashat Kedoshim – 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Kedoshim
By Rabbi Isaac Mann
This week’s sidra begins with the Divine command directed to the Children of Israel to be holy (kedoshim tih’yu) “for I the Lord your God am holy” (Lev. 19:2). In Hebrew, the root meaning of kadosh is separate. This prompts us to ask what is the nature of this holiness or separation that God requires of us and how do we achieve it?
At first glance one might respond to these questions by saying: “Look further in the text.” Indeed the very first commandment that follows is the obligation to fear one’s father and mother. This is followed in the same verse by the instruction to observe the Sabbath. The next verse warns us against idolatrous practices. This is followed by some specific instructions regarding the offering of sacrifices. And many more specific halakhot follow in the ensuing verses and chapters without an appearance Read More >
Parashat Acharei Mot – 5779
| Yom Kippur Asks “Answers” – Not Just “Afflictions” A D’var Torah for Parashat Acharei Mot By Rabbi David Markus This week’s parashah (Acharei Mot) brings Torah’s first mention of Yom Kippur (#sorry), so each year this parashah starts me thinking about the High Holy Days (#notsorry). Each year, I recall how three words in this parashah once drove me from Judaism. So each year, I renew my commitment to wrestle these words that challenge me. This parashah’s three challenging words are: “afflict your souls.” Torah “sets a law for all time that [on Yom Kippur] you will afflict your souls (t’anu et nafshoteikhem) and do no work” (Lev. 16:29). That day is to be a “complete shabbat (shabbat shabbaton) [on which] you will afflict your souls (v’initem et nafshoteikhem)” (Lev. 16:31). For Yom Kippur, one mention of “afflict” didn’t suffice: Torah had to say it twice. From “afflict your souls” evolved Yom Kippur’s fasting, abstinence, and Read More > |
Last Days of Pesah – 5779
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First Days of Pesah – 5779
Hametz of the Soul: The Yeast Within
A D’var Torah for the first days of Pesah
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
“And what prevents us from performing Your will? It is the yeast in the dough.” Rabbi Alexandri
The Vilna Gaon (1720-1797), one of our greatest rabbis, provided an important answer to a question which each of us may ask from time to time.
“Why are we here?”
Indeed, we navigate our lives, apply our God-given talents, interact with others, but ultimately what is the purpose of it all?
The Vilna Gaon considered this question, and suggested that, simply stated, the purpose of life is to turn ourselves into something better.
In his commentary on the Book of Proverbs – the Vilna Gaon expanded on verse 4:13 which reads “hold fast to discipline; do not let it go; Keep it. It is your life.”
And how did he interpret the phrase “it is your life?” The Vilna Gaon noted: Read More >
Parashat Metzorah 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Metzorah
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
A few years ago I passed the age at which my mother died. Doing so changed my perspective on my own life. I still want to think of my continuing good health as an entitlement, but it’s hard to do so when you have lived longer than the one who gave you life. Indeed, if there is one prayer that I utter more than any other, it is the one about the nikavim nikavim, halulim halulim – the complex of passageways and orifices that make up the human body, the proper functioning of each one being necessary for our existence.
I thought about that passage while reading of the purification ritual for one who has been cured of tzara-at. Often mistranslated as leprosy, I long ago gave up trying to understand what disease or collection of diseases tzara-at might be. Instead, it has become for me a stand-in for Read More >
Parashat Tazria
A D’var Torah for Parashat Tazria
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
Much of the text of Parashat Tazria is about skin disease. These verses, from Leviticus 13:1-46, lay out in remarkable detail numerous variations of skin-related afflictions and how these are to be treated. On the surface one might think that the intention is to demonstrate concern for the physical health and welfare of the community. On the other hand, perhaps the underlying concern is less literal, and is, rather, a statement on the importance of distinguishing between that which is impure from that which is pure. A third take, and what I believe may be a significant function of this text, is that this is about power, specifically the power of the kohanim, the priests. Let us examine each of these viewpoints.
The detailed descriptions of the many variations of skin lesions, and how they are to be managed, seem to read like a medical manual for its Read More >
Parashat Shemini
The Center of the Torah
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shemini
By Rabbi Len Levin
“The Masoret (textual tradition) is a safeguarding fence around the Torah.” (Avot 3:13)
What is the core of the Torah? At several places in this week’s Torah reading and in adjacent readings, the astute reader will see notes indicating that this or that verse is the center of the Torah counting by verses, by words, or by letters. What is this about?
The Talmud relates: “The earlier authorities were called soferim [scribes] because they counted [soferim] all the letters of the Torah” (Kiddushin 30a).
From this they concluded that the center of the Torah, counting by letters, is the vav in the word gahon (belly) in the verse, “You shall not eat anything that crawls on its belly” (Lev. 11:42). Counting by verses, it is the verse “[The leper] shall shave himself” (Lev. 13.33). And counting by words, it Read More >
Parashat Shemini
The Center of the Torah
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shemini
By Rabbi Len Levin
“The Masoret (textual tradition) is a safeguarding fence around the Torah.” (Avot 3:13)
What is the core of the Torah? At several places in this week’s Torah reading and in adjacent readings, the astute reader will see notes indicating that this or that verse is the center of the Torah counting by verses, by words, or by letters. What is this about?
The Talmud relates: “The earlier authorities were called soferim [scribes] because they counted [soferim] all the letters of the Torah” (Kiddushin 30a).
From this they concluded that the center of the Torah, counting by letters, is the vav in the word gahon (belly) in the verse, “You shall not eat anything that crawls on its belly” (Lev. 11:42). Counting by verses, it is the verse “[The leper] shall shave himself” (Lev. 13.33). And counting by words, it Read More >
Parashat Tzav
A D’var Torah for Parashat Tzav
By Rabbi Isaac Mann
The prohibition in the Torah against the consumption of blood, which is expressed in this week’s parashah (see Lev. 7:26-27), is generally seen in the context of the laws of kashrut. Just as the Torah prohibits the eating of meat from unclean animals or from animals that were improperly slaughtered or were unfit due to organic disease, so too certain parts of a kosher animal, like the fat (heilev) or the blood (dam) are off-limits. In connection with the latter, the Shulhan Arukh describes various salting and draining methods to rid the meat of any blood that may have flowed into it in order to render it kosher. The pertinent rules and techniques are juxtaposed to the laws that deal with shehitah (ritual slaughtering) and tereifot (diseased animals).
Interestingly, the Torah does not mention the prohibitions against eating the fat or the blood of Read More >
Parashat Vayikra 5779
Controlling the High Price of Judaism (and Guilt)
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayikra
By Rabbi David Markus
The Jewish value of tzedakah underscores that to “be Jewish” is partly to “do Jewish,” and to “do Jewish” means to support others. That’s one reason that Judaism calls for tzedakah as charitable acts of support for others that double as communal acts of identity.
Important as tzedakah is, however, tzedakah isn’t a sufficient solution when it becomes too pricy to “do Jewish” in the first place – as increasingly is happening across vast swaths of Jewish life.
The economics of traditional Jewish ways have trended toward narrowcasting Judaism toward affluence. This income effect, in turn, lifts costs higher. Especially for Millennials, high cost can become a practical barrier and/or psychological barrier to doing Jewish.
These dynamics amplify vexing questions about inclusivity and continuity in Jewish life. Cost concerns raise lamentations about Judaism’s socioeconomic privilege, inspiring some to call for cost controls. Even sharp-penciled Read More >
Parashat Pekudei 5779
A Bell and a Pomegranate
A D’var Torah for Parashat Pekudei
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
A few months ago, I had the pleasure of visiting the Rubin Museum of Art in southern Manhattan, which displays items from the cultures of the Himalayas, India, and neighboring regions, with a particular emphasis on Tibetan art. Much of this art is spiritual, and related to Buddhist or Hindu practices. One ritual item I saw in multiple forms was the bell, one of the most important tools of Tibetan Buddhism. The bell, in that tradition, represents emptiness, wisdom, and truth. Another item, the vajra or scepter, represents bliss, action, and compassion, and is considered the complement to the bell—together they represent the union of all dualities, including the feminine and masculine. This got me thinking about bells and their companions a little closer to home: the bells and pomegranates on the bottom of the robe of the high priest in Parashat Pekudei.
The text Read More >
Parashat Vayakhel 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayakhel
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
In this week’s Torah portion, Vayakhel, the Israelites finally get to do something. Something sanctioned, something that is approved—in fact, instructed—by God through Moses. Moses has received the detailed instructions from God to build a dwelling-place for God among the Israelites, the Tabernacle. The Israelites became restless and anxious while waiting for Moses: In last week’s Torah portion they made the Golden Calf, and were punished for it.
Now Moses stands before them again, and this time they are not in trouble. Moses begins by instructing them to work six days of the week, but to rest on the seventh. Then they are instructed to bring as gifts the materials needed to build the Tabernacle, and they bring, and bring, and bring, until there is more than is needed and they have to be told to stop.
Why do they bring so much? Rebbe Yehudah Read More >
Parashat Ki Tissa 5779
What is a Half Shekel Worth?
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ki Tissa
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
About three years ago, a mysterious envelope with no return address arrived on my desk.
I opened it cautiously, slowly pulling out a blank white folded card which contained half of a twenty dollar bill.
Was this some kind of slur? Was it a practical joke? I paused for a moment, shook my head, and slipped the half bill in my desk drawer and continued with whatever I was doing.
About a month later, I rediscovered the torn bill under a cluster of papers, and later, while making a bank deposit, presented it to the teller.
“What do I do with this?” I asked. “Is there some way I can give it to charity? What is half of a twenty dollar bill worth anyway?
And she coldly replied, “It is worth nothing without the other half.” She then pulled a laminated card Read More >
Parashat Tetzavah 5779
| A D’var Torah for Parashat Tetzavah By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11) I imagine that I am like many people who read Terumah and Tetzavah – last week’s and this week’s Torah portions – with a mixture of frustration and intrigue; frustration at being unable to fully follow the details of the design of the Mishkan and its many furnishings, and intrigue because of the materials used: glowing jewels, gleaming metals and rich fabrics. Yet in reading through this week’s details of the priestly robes, particularly those of the high priest, one detail stuck out to me. The two most unusual garments, the Ephod and the Hoshen Mishpat (essentially a vest and a breastplate) both were adorned with the names of the twelve tribes of Israel. The reason given for this adornment is the same for both garments: as a remembrance before the Lord (Exodus 28:12 & 29) But we might ask, remembrance of what? I think Read More > |
Parashat Terumah 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Terumah
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
V’asu li mikdash v’shakhanti b’tokham
“And they shall make for Me a sanctuary and I will dwell in their midst”
Some people require periods of solitude in order to best function in the world. In fact, self-chosen solitude is generally considered to be beneficial, particularly in today’s increasingly social-media-run, group-conscious culture. And although our biblical ancestors obviously didn’t have cellphones or Twitter accounts as they wandered in the wilderness, the conditions of their lifestyle – being constantly surrounded by hundreds of thousands of people — similarly was not conducive to seeking solitude. Two weeks ago in the Torah portion Yitro, we read about how the Israelite people stood together in fear and awe as God’s laws were revealed to them; had I been there, I imagine I would not be the only one in need of some alone-time so as to reflect on what had Read More >
Parashat Mishpatim 5779
We the People, in Covenant with God
A D’var Torah for Parashat Mishpatim
By Rabbi Len Levin
“And these are the rules that you shall set before them.” (Exodus 21:1)
Who are the them before whom God instructs Moses to set the rules in this week’s portion?
Rashi, following the Talmud (Gittin 88b), interprets this verse as teaching that the judicial rules are to be entrusted to the ordained Israelite judges, not to gentile courts or to Israelite lay persons. On this reading, them refers to the judges (playing on lifneihem to suggest lifnim [within]—a subset of the people).
But the context of this passage suggests a broader audience. This verse is a continuation of the speech beginning in Exodus 20:19: “The Lord said to Moses: Thus shall you say to the Israelites: You yourselves saw that I spoke to you from the very heavens.” On this contextual reading, the rules of Parashat Mishpatim are Read More >
Parashat Yitro 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Yitro
By Rabbi Matthew Goldstone
At the beginning of this week’s parasha Moses’ father-in-law, Yitro, hears of “all that God had done for Moses and the Israelites” (Exod. 18:1) and he brings Moses’ wife and children to join the Israelites in the desert. Moses goes out to greet Yitro and warmly welcomes him into his tent. Moses then recounts to his father-in-law all of the miraculous deeds that God performed to bring the Israelites out of Egypt and Yitro rejoices (Exod. 18:8-9). But wait. If Yitro already heard about “all that God had done for Moses and the Israelites,” then why does he only rejoice after hearing all of this again from Moses? By this point the exodus is old news! Perhaps the answer lies not in the message but in the messenger. Hearing secondhand, even about miracles such as the splitting of the sea, is simply Read More >
Parashat Beshallah 5779
A D’car Torah for Parashat Beshallah
By Rabbi David Evan Markus
It’s an occupational hazard. We clergy so delight in bringing Torah to life and liturgy to life that we might unashamedly “geek out” – especially when we do both at the same time. When I link Torah with liturgy in ways that enliven both, my joy can be irrepressible. (Thankfully my New York congregation seems to like it, and my closest friends at least grudgingly tolerate it.)
This week’s portion (Beshallah) and its Song of the Sea seem ready-made for this Torah-liturgy two-fer of joy.
Morning and evening, traditional liturgy after the Shema brings us to the Sea of Reeds (Ex. 14). We reach the shore of entrapping finitude and then, with holy help, we’re invited to see the impossible into being. By suspending disbelief and experiencing the miracle, we can go free again and again. This journey from bondage to freedom is the journey of Jewish Read More >
Parashat Bo 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bo
By Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
In this week’s Torah portion, Bo, we are in the midst of the dramatic story of the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, when they go from slavery to freedom. Because it is the story we retell at Passover, it is one of the most familiar in the Torah. God frees the Israelites “with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm” (Psalm 136:12).
In parashat Bo, the last three of the ten plagues befall the Egyptians: locusts, darkness, and the death of the first-born. The penultimate plague, darkness, seems like it might be less destructive than the other two. After all, it gets dark every night, and we all get through it. But this wasn’t like that regular, natural darkness. This was three solid days of “darkness that can be touched” (Exodus 10:21). “A person could not see his brother or sister, and for Read More >
Parashat Va’era 5779
Hearing more voices in the Passover story
A D’var Totah for Parashat Va’era
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
The story of the enslavement of Jewish people in Egypt is perhaps one of the most powerful stories within the entire Torah. It is the stuff of heroes and villains, slavery and liberation.
It has captured the imagination of those across many faiths and cultural backgrounds, and continues to inspire Passover – perhaps the most observed holiday across all of Judaism.
Yet, there are so many gaps and unanswered questions.
Indeed, while this week’s Parashah, Va’era (And God appeared) engages us in a thrilling narrative of miracles and plagues, there is perhaps one central perspective which is sorely lacking: “Where are the voices of the Israelites and Egyptians – those who were the most affected by this dramatic story of slavery and human suffering?”
Isn’t it interesting that the entire Passover story is told almost exclusively through three main characters: Moses, Read More >
Parashat Shemot 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shemot
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
Living up to its own name, our Torah portion, Shemot – Names – has a lot of them. Some of them are known to us. Some are new. And some aren’t given at all.
Among the new names are those of Shiphrah and Puah – the two midwives whom Pharaoh orders to kill all the male Israelite newborns. And therein lies a curiosity. We know the names of the servants. We don’t know the name of the king they serve. Indeed, his only identifying characteristic seems to be that he “did not know Joseph.” (Exodus 1:8).
The Rashi on this verse directs us to a dispute in the Talmud between Rav and Shmuel as to this Pharaoh’s identity (Sotah 11a). One insists that he really is a new leader, while the other claims it was the same Pharaoh as in Joseph’s time who issued new decrees following the latter’s death. To me, Read More >
Parashat Vayehi 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayehi
by Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
With Parashat Vayehi we come to the end of the book of Genesis, the completion of a series of individual narratives including those of our matriarchs and patriarchs.
Let us imagine for a moment that Genesis and the following book of Exodus are two parts of a movie, each with its own musical soundtrack. Genesis ends on a happy note as Jacob is buried in the family plot at Makhpela in Canaan, surrounded by his family — grand-finale-type music, or perhaps a mellow, sweet melody. Camera pans out. Suddenly, the tone of the movie score alters dramatically as the Exodus narrative begins — a sinister motif suggesting the portent of things to come, the slavery of our people at the hands of a paranoid and cruel pharaoh. There’s trouble ahead!
Pause. We’re not ready to move forward yet. High-speed rewind. Let’s take another look at that Genesis happy ending, Read More >
Parashat Vayiggash 5779
Reconciliation is Difficult
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayiggash
by Rabbi Len Levin
“Then Judah went up to him and said, Please, my lord…” (Gen. 44:18)
“And Joseph could no longer refrain before all those standing before him…” (Gen. 45:1)
Reconciliation is difficult.
This week’s Torah reading provides the climax to a narrative that has been unfolding for the past several weeks. This narrative begs to be read on two levels—on the level of a specific family, and on the level of social groups.
On the specific level, there is a clash of personalities, such as we experience in many families. The personalities are sharply different, and the sharp personal differences generate conflicts that escalate to critical proportions. In a family of strong personalities, Joseph is extraordinary, and he demands to be treated as special. The brothers resent his superiority attitude and find dubious ways to be rid of him, at great cost to their integrity and Read More >
Parashat Vayigash 5779
Reconciliation is Difficult
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayiggash
by Rabbi Len Levin
“Then Judah went up to him and said, Please, my lord…” (Gen. 44:18)
“And Joseph could no longer refrain before all those standing before him…” (Gen. 45:1)
Reconciliation is difficult.
This week’s Torah reading provides the climax to a narrative that has been unfolding for the past several weeks. This narrative begs to be read on two levels—on the level of a specific family, and on the level of social groups.
On the specific level, there is a clash of personalities, such as we experience in many families. The personalities are sharply different, and the sharp personal differences generate conflicts that escalate to critical proportions. In a family of strong personalities, Joseph is extraordinary, and he demands to be treated as special. The brothers resent his superiority attitude and find dubious ways to be rid of him, at great cost to their integrity and Read More >
Parashat Miketz 5779
Joseph: Is He Greater than the Patriarchs?
A D’var Torah for Parashat Miketz
by Rabbi Isaac Mann
As the lights of the Hanukah menorah grow from day to day, so does our fascination with the story of Joseph in the Bible (which we read about in the synagogue on Hanukah) increase from year to year. What is it about this story, the longest in the Torah, that we never tire from discussing and thinking about?
While there are many answers to this question, most of which relate to Joseph’s character, a new thought came to me that I would like to express in this D’var Torah, and it starts with a question. Why is it that Joseph, who the Rabbis referred to as Yosef ha-Zaddik (see, e.g. Yoma 35b) – Joseph the Righteous – never received any communication from God, not even from an angel, as did his forebears, the Patriarchs, all of whom merited Read More >
Parashat Vayeishev 5779
Keeping the Mind in Mind: The Essence of Pluralism
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayeishev
By Rabbi David Evan Markus
Exciting news: studying theology can teach us how to think and even build secular careers! Whatever one’s beliefs, immersion in the complexities of sacred text can expand perspective and cultivate character. Studying theology can make the mind nimbler, the heart more tender and the spirit wiser.
But for all of theology’s great promise, theology doesn’t promise certitude. The call to cultivate mind, heart and spirit isn’t about fixity or certainty, but rather something far more important.
Exhibit A: Jacob’s response to Joseph’s dreams in Parshat Vayeishev.
Joseph recounts his dream of 11 stars, sun, and moon bowing to him. Jacob responds with pique (“are parents to worship their child?”) and Joseph’s 11 brothers seethe with jealousy (Gen. 37:10-11a). The encounter ends with Torah narrating that Jacob shamar et ha-davar: he “kept the matter [in mind]” ( Read More >
Parashat Vayishlah 5779
The Oak of Weeping
A D’var Torah for Vayishlah
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
Devorah the wetnurse of Rivkah died and was buried under Beth El, under the oak. And he called it the Oak of Weeping (Alon Bahut). (Genesis 35:8)
Devorah, Rivkah’s nurse, died, and they buried her beneath the city under the oak of the river, and he called the name of the place “the river of Devorah” and he called the name of the oak “the oak of the mourning of Devorah.” (Jubilees 32:30)
Rabbi Shmuel bar Nahman said: The word alon (oak) is Greek and means “another,” for as Yaakov was mourning for Devorah, the news came to him that his mother (Rivkah) had died. This is why it says: “God appeared to him and blessed him.” What was the blessing? The blessing to comfort mourners. (Genesis Rabbah 81:5)
Wedged among the many peaks of the literary landscape of Parashat Vayishlah is a small funeral Read More >
Parashat Vayeitze 5779
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayeitze
by Rabbi Heidi Hoover (AJR ’11)
At the beginning of this week’s Torah portion, Jacob leaves home. He doesn’t leave by choice, though. He has to leave because his life is in danger–his brother wants to kill him. He runs away, ending up in the wilderness, alone, with nothing, it seems, except the clothes he is wearing. He sleeps with his head on a rock. He’s headed in the direction of Haran, where his mother’s family lives, but he has never met them. Jacob is not an immigrant. He is a refugee.
In that desolate night when he is so alone, Jacob has a dream of a ladder to heaven, with angels going up and down the ladder. God assures him that he will be protected and have countless descendants. It is an amazing experience for Jacob, who says after he awakens, “God was in this place, and I Read More >
Parashat Toledot – 5779
“Mom Always Liked You Best!”
A D’var Torah for Parashat Toledot
By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10)
During the late 1960s, one of the most popular comedy programs on television was the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.
The team of Tom and Dick Smothers was a mainstay of CBS’s Sunday night programming, for two distinct reasons.
As public discourse over the Vietnam War heated, the brothers’ comedy would bring the anti-war protest directly into American homes, eventually leading to their cancellation by the network.
However, fifty years later, what endures most about the Smothers Brothers’ comedy was its ability to capture the subtleties of human relationships—in particular between two brothers.
Invariably, as the dialogue between these two siblings would deteriorate, it was Tommy Smothers—always portrayed as the dimmer of the two—who would attempt to trump his brother’s well-reasoned arguments with the accusation, “Well, Mom always liked you best!”
This week, as our Torah portion turns to the relationships within the family of Read More >
Parashat Hayyei Sarah – 5779
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Parashat Vayera – 5779
| A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayera by Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14) Our matriarch Sarah is held in high esteem. Her kindness in welcoming strangers is a trait she shares with Abraham, and it is said that on the day she gave birth to Isaac many other barren women similarly “were remembered” and also gave birth (Bereishit Rabbah 53:8). Yet the Torah places her in the background rather than at her husband’s side, even with events that directly affect her.Parashat Vayera begins as Abraham welcomes three strangers (messengers of God) who are passing by in the heat of mid-day. Abraham enlists Sarah’s help in preparing food for them, then she remains behind while he goes out to sit with the visitors. They ask him, “Where is Sarah your wife?” and Abraham replies that she is in the tent (Gen. 18:9). Then they tell him that at this time next year they will return and Read More > |
Parashat Lekh Lekha – 5779
| The Encounter of Abraham and Melchizedek A D’var Torah for Parashat Lekh Lekha by Rabbi Lenny Levin “And King Melchizedek of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was a priest of God Most High (El Elyon). He blessed him, saying, “Blessed be Abram of God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth…” (Gen. 14:18–19) “Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I swear to the Lord (YH-VH), God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth…” (Gen. 14:22) Whenever Jews pray the Amidah, the Prayer par excellence, they invoke the name El Elyon, “God Most High” (and the Friday night liturgy adds: “Creator of heaven and earth”). But it is one of the rarer names for God in the Hebrew Bible. The more common names for God in the Bible are the Tetragrammaton (the four-letter personal name of God, represented in Hebrew by yod, hei, vav, hei, usually pronounced Adonai or Hashem Read More > |
Parashat Noah – 5779
A D’var Torah for Noah
By Rabbi Isaac Mann
Much has been written by the Bible commentators on the sins that caused God to bring on the Great Flood in the time of Noah. But little ink has been spilled (or keys pressed) in regard to what motivated the Supreme Being to ensure that there will never be a flood again to destroy the world (see Gen. 8:21, 9:8-17).
Surely if the corruption of humankind, and possibly the animal kingdom as well, brought on God’s anger (see Gen. 6:5-7, 11-13) and justified the destruction of all beings (except for Noah and those with him in the Ark), then what would happen if there would be a replay of this selfsame corruption? God’s hands, so to speak, would be tied by the oath He took not to put an end to all life. But then does that imply that He was wrong Read More >
Parashat Bereshit 5779
Genesis (En)gendered: An Angelic View from Eden’s Way
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bereshit
by Rabbi David Markus
This momentous #metoo #ibelieveyou moment urges us to see old stories with new eyes. Reading sacred texts with ever renewing eyes is one of many ways that theology teaches us how to see and think – to reach beyond ourselves, to not become calcified and thus brittle, to strengthen our capacity to hold multiplicity and nuance without falling into hopeless relativism or nihilism.
Let’s start at the very beginning (“a very good place to start“). What might this moment of societal gender and sexual reckoning mean for how we read Torah’s sacred story of Creation, ostensibly the most familiar narrative in the Jewish canon?
That we can ask this question about Torah’s most familiar narrative itself says something important – and something hopeful – about the theological project of renewing our eyes and expanding what we see and how we see. (Pirkei Avot Read More >
Parashat Nitzavim 5778
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Parashat Ki Tavo 5778
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ki Tavo
by Rabbi Bruce Alpert (’11)
One of the sublime joys of studying at AJR is experiencing tefillah in its community – especially at Retreat. Being in a room with 70 or 80 people, each of whom is, in some way, expert at Jewish prayer, is wondrous. And with a leader who is seeking – through her choice of prayers, songs, and niggunim – to impress upon her congregants a particular insight or perspective on our liturgy, you have an experience that can meet the high expectations for kavanah, for the intentionality that our rabbis have set for us as our goal in communicating with the Holy One.
I came to AJR with a very limited and narrow perspective on prayer. AJR broadened that perspective to my horizons, and then beyond them. It did so by fulfilling the words of Psalm 100: “Serve the Lord in gladness; come into His presence with Read More >
Parashat Ki Teitzei 5778
Restoring What Has Been Lost
A D’var Torah for Parashat Ki Teitzei
by Rabbi Rena Kieval (’06)
When life gets busy, with many distractions, I have a tendency to misplace objects: my keys, my cell phone, or a piece of mail with important information. Most of us have had the experience of losing an item whose absence disrupts the tasks of daily life. When that happens, a possession can take on an importance out of proportion to its true value. Even when we lose an object that is not especially essential, something feels awry, out of kilter. Lost objects can have a strange power, an ability to make everything feel disrupted. Conversely, when a lost object is located or returned, the relief can be huge: order seems to be restored.
The mitzvah of hashavat aveidah, the obligation to return lost objects to their owner, is stressed in the Torah and later rabbinic tradition. Parashat Ki Teitzei includes this mitzvah among its treasure trove Read More >
Parashat Shoftim
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Parashat Re’eh 5778
A D’var Torah for Parashat Re’eh
By Rabbi Isaac Mann
For this week’s d’var Torah on parashat Re’eh, I would like to share with you some homiletic interpretations that pertain to the mitzvah of tzedakah (roughly translated as “charity”) and that express some deep insights into this mitzvah.
The Torah devotes several verses to encouraging and demanding that the Jewish people give charity (through tithes) or lend money to the poor. In this week’s Torah sidra, the obligation to give to the needy is first expressed in the form of two negative commandments – “You shall not harden your heart and you shall not close your hand from your needy brother” (Deut. 15:7). This is followed by a positive instruction – “Rather you shall surely open your hand to him, and you shall lend him sufficient for his needs which he is lacking” (15:8).
Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch in his commentary on the Pentateuch observes that Read More >
Eikev 5778
A D’Var Torah for Parashat Eikev
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
“Dear when you smiled at me, I heard a melody
It haunted me from the start
Something inside of me started a symphony
Zing! Went the strings of my heart”
These lyrics come from a song made famous by Judy Garland in 1938 and recorded by others many times since. “Zing went the strings of my heart…” What does this mean, exactly? According to Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary, the term “heartstrings” refers to one’s “deepest emotions or affections”. According to our singer, “Zing!” is the sound of heartstrings tugged by love.
Imagine our awareness of Divine Love being so strong, so immediate that it would make our heart go “Zing!” Perhaps that is what God is asking of the Israelites in Parashat Eikev this week when they are commanded, “U’maltem et orlat l’vavkhem v’arp’khem lo takshu od”, “You shall circumcise the foreskin of your heart, therefore, and be Read More >
Va’ethanan 5778
The Paradox of Faces
A D’var Torah for Va’ethanan
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
This parashah is a second telling of the wilderness revelation: a remix of Sinai, if you will. Our parashah is a part of the long speech Moses makes to his people as they are about to enter the land of Canaan. It is also the center of a crucial Jewish paradox.
Moses describes the revelation at Sinai by saying: “The Eternal spoke to you out of the fire, you heard the voice of words (kol devarim) but you saw no image, nothing but a voice.”
This description of revelation is so complex as to resemble a Zen koan. First of all, in spite of the way I just translated it, it’s in the present tense: ‘You hear the voice of words, but you see no image, nothing but a voice.” It’s a description of God focused on sound, voice, story, and yet we see Read More >
Devarim 5778
Call for Spiritual Rebirth
A Dvar Torah for Devarim
By Len Levin
“How [eikhah] can I bear alone your trouble, your burden, your quarrel?” (Deut. 1:12)
A paradox. Deuteronomy is the sunniest, most radiant and optimistic book of the Torah. “And now, O Israel, what does the Lord your God demand of you? Only this: to revere the Lord your God, to walk only in His paths, to love him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and soul” (10:12). “The Lord your God is bringing you into a good land…where you will lack nothing” (8:7-8). “The Lord your God will bless you in all you do” (15:18). “For you will do what is good and right in the eyes of the Lord your God (12:28).
But it also contains dark passages. There is the historical recollection of the Golden Calf (9:8-21). There are the Read More >
Mattot/Massei 5778
A D’var Torah for Mattot/Massei
by Rabbi Heidi Hoover (AJR ’11)
In this week’s Torah portion, Mattot/Massei, we have a remarkable episode. Two tribes, Reuben and Gad, look around the land where they Israelites are staying before they enter the Promised Land. They see that the land where they are is good for cattle, and they are cattle-herders. They decide this is the land they want, instead of the allotment of land they’ve been promised in Canaan.
What is surprising about this portion is that we’ve taken it for granted ever since the Exodus that what the Israelites really want is to get to the Promised Land. That was the destination after the Exodus. During the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness they’ve just been waiting for the opportunity to get into the Promised Land. Or so we would think. Then along comes this passage where two tribes go to Moses and say, “We’re Read More >
Pinhas 5778
A D’var Torah for Pinhas
by Rabbi Bruce Alpert (AJR ’11)
Merely to have survived is not an index of excellence,
Nor, given the way things go,
Even of low cunning.
Yet I have seen the wicked in great power,
And spreading himself like a green bay tree.
And the good as if they had never been;
Their voices are blown away on the winter wind.
Those familiar with the old Reform mahzor, Gates of Repentance, will recognize these lines from the poem Words for the Day of Atonement by Anthony Hecht. They remind us that, even if lacking in other virtues, survival itself is the necessary component and, in times of distress, a lofty enough goal.
Mere survival is the underlying theme of this week’s parashah, Pinhas. The various threats to that survival that have arisen over time – the sin Read More >
Balak 5778
Blessing in Boise : A Balak Moment
A D’var Torah for Balak
by Rabbi Rena H. Kieval (AJR ’06)
Sometimes it seems that we live in a world filled with curses. In this country of late, we have been witness to cruel treatment of the most vulnerable among us, and have been immersed in hateful rhetoric and fear-mongering. From fear, can come anger. From fear can come an impulse to curse.
So it is in this week’s parsha, in a scene sadly familiar to us Jews. Balak, king of Moab, fearing the Israelites, loathing these outsiders, wants to curse them. Balak has choices about how to deal with his fear: he has a choice between cursing the others, or having his own people protected and blessed. Coming from a place of hatred and negativity, he opts for the curse and hires Balaam the sorcerer to carry out the Read More >
Hukat 5778
Miriam’s Obituary:
A D’var Torah for Hukat
by Rabbi Irwin Huberman (AJR ’10)
“The Israelites arrived in a body at the wilderness of Zin on the first new moon, and the people stayed at Kadesh. Miriam died there and was buried there.” (Numbers 20:1)
The descendants of Miriam wish to advise you of the passing of our beloved ancestral mother, during the reading of this week’s Torah portion.
While the Biblical version of Miriam’s passing is limited to a short mention in this week’s parashah, we, the inheritors of Judaism’s oral tradition, would like to tell you more about her life and her legacy.
Additional stories, contained in the Midrash, Talmud and other commentaries, provide additional layers to her story. These teachings from our oral tradition are important, as we eulogize her today.
Miriam was born in Egypt during a time of slavery and persecution. Without Miriam’s intervention, it is conceivable that Moses, our greatest leader, may Read More >
Korah 5778
A D’var Torah for Korah
by Rabbi Isaac Mann
The conflict between Moses and Korah, which occupies much of this week’s parashah, is usually seen as a struggle between right and wrong. Indeed the Torah itself warns us (Numb. 17:5) that we should not be like Korah and his followers (ve’lo yiyeh khe’Korah ve’kha’a’doto). In a similar vein the Rabbis in Pirkei Avot (Chapters of the Fathers 5:20) depict Korah and his followers as engaging in a mahloket she’lo le’shem Shamayim (“a conflict that is antithetical to Heaven”) and thus one that we should stay away from. In the Talmud (Sanhedrin 109b) it is stated, according to R. Akiva, that Korah and his followers have no portion in the World to Come.
However, a more nuanced reading of the Korah story leaves one wondering whether there was some merit in the arguments that he advanced against Moses’ and Aaron’s leadership – and to Read More >
Shelah Lekha 5778
A D’var Torah for Shelah Lekha
by Cantor Sandy Horowitz ’14
In the story of the twelve spies who scout out the land of Canaan in Parashat Shelah Lekha we experience several different leadership styles — from the spies, Joshua and Caleb, Moses and God.
God instructs Moses to send representatives from each of the twelve tribes, “everyone a leader among them”, to spy on Canaan, the land which God has promised to the Israelites. After forty days they return and ten of these tribal leaders produce an “evil report” with regard to the overwhelming size and strength of the Canaanite people. An eleventh, Caleb, expresses disagreement and suggests going right away to possess the land (Numbers 13:30). But his is a lone voice, as the ten continue their litany of fear and exaggeration.
In response the people “lifted up their voice and cried” (Numbers 14:1). They speak out against Moses, Aaron and God, Read More >
Beha’halotekha 5778
The Waving
A D’var Torah for Beha’alotekha
by Rabbi Jill Hammer
“You shall bring the Levites close before the Divine, and the Israelites shall lay their hands on the Levites, and Aaron shall wave the Levites as a wave-offering before the Divine…” Numbers 8:10-11
Among the many kinds of offerings we encounter in the Torah, the one that fascinates me most is the tenufah: the wave-offering. The root of tenufah comes from a word that means to flutter or undulate. A priest must wave the offering before God at the altar, rather than burning it. This waving appears to indicate that the entity being waved belongs to God. The wave-offering is then given to the priests to consume.
This offering is used for the first omer/measure of barley at Pesah, the first fruits at Shavuot, as well as the two loaves of Shavuot (Mishnah Menahot 5:5-6). The lulav is Read More >
Naso 5778
A Puzzling Law, Seen in Context
A D’var Torah for Naso
by Rabbi Len Levin
“I will not punish their daughters for loose behavior,
Nor their daughters-in-law for infidelity,
For they themselves turn aside with whores
And sacrifice with prostitutes” (Hosea 4:14).
Sometimes the Torah speaks to us as a timeless document, whose proclamations (“love your neighbor as yourself”; “you shall love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” — Lev. 19:18, Deut. 10:19) are as relevant to us today as when they were first uttered.
At other times, its laws seem situated in a culture and society so remote from ours, that to tease the universal message from its particulars is a frustrating and complicated task. The law of the ordeal of the bitter waters for the wife of the jealous husband is one of those cases.
The history of Read More >
Bemidbar 5778
Seeing Those We Overlook
A D’var Torah for Bemidbar
by Rabbi Heidi Hoover (’11)
When we study our Torah portions, we often notice what’s missing, what’s not said. What happens during the three days between the time God tells Abraham to sacrifice Isaac and the time Abraham and Isaac arrive at the mountain where the sacrifice is to take place? What happens to Jonah while he is in the belly of the fish?
This week’s Torah portion, Bemidbar, the first parashah of the book of Numbers, is all about counting people. That’s where the name of the book in English, Numbers, comes from. (In Hebrew, Bemidbar means “in the wilderness.”) All the men from every tribe except Levi are counted, and in a separate count, the men from Levi are counted. A glaring absence in this Torah portion, something that we notice is missing, is any mention of women. Women are not in our Torah portion Read More >
Bahar-BeHukkotai 5778
A D’var Torah for Bahar-BeHukkotai
by Rabbi Bruce Alpert ’11
We are surrounded by layers of reality. . . There are swarms of ghosts, spirits, phantoms, souls, angels and devils. . . The smallest pebble has a life of its own. . . Everything is alive. And everything is God or God’s intention. . .
These lines are from Ingmar Bergman’s film Fanny & Alexander. They are attributed to a pious Jew who seemingly magically saves two children from the clutches of their evil stepfather. One of the children, the sensitive Alexander, has perceived this layered reality all along as his father’s ghost has become his companion in grief.
I have never been much into mysticism. My hesitancy is not so much based on rational skepticism but rather on my inability to understand mysticism’s subtlety and nuance. But the juxtaposition of two verses in this week’s double Torah portion, Behar-Bekhukotai, have led me to wonder whether Read More >
Parshiyot Behar-Behukotai 5778
A D’var Torah for Bahar-BeHukkotai
by Rabbi Bruce Alpert ’11
We are surrounded by layers of reality. . . There are swarms of ghosts, spirits, phantoms, souls, angels and devils. . . The smallest pebble has a life of its own. . . Everything is alive. And everything is God or God’s intention. . .
These lines are from Ingmar Bergman’s film Fanny & Alexander. They are attributed to a pious Jew who seemingly magically saves two children from the clutches of their evil stepfather. One of the children, the sensitive Alexander, has perceived this layered reality all along as his father’s ghost has become his companion in grief.
I have never been much into mysticism. My hesitancy is not so much based on rational skepticism but rather on my inability to understand mysticism’s subtlety and nuance. But the juxtaposition of two verses in this week’s double Torah portion, Behar-Bekhukotai, have led me to wonder whether Read More >
Aharei Mot/Kedoshim 5778
Torah, sexuality and #MeToo
A D’var Toroh for Aharei Mot/Kedoshim
by Rabbi Irwin Huberman ’10
Within Judaism, there exists a debate regarding the reading of some explicit sexual material on the afternoon of Yom Kippur.
Orthodox Judaism encourages us to read from the Torah what are commonly referred to as the arayot – forbidden sexual relationships.
Conservative Judaism offers an alternative — suggesting a second reading dealing with interpersonal relationships, business practices, ritual behavior and criminal law.
Reform Judaism often bypasses sexuality, choosing Biblical texts that highlight reconciliation, ethical behavior and social justice.
Indeed, the discussion of forbidden sexual practices on the holy and reflective day of Yom Kippur is a challenging one.
Yet, is it possible that the same Torah reading, which so many rabbis and congregations have struggled with in recent years, demands a rereading in light of so many sexual abuses and allegations that have come to light this past year?
More specifically, is there a thematic connection between the Read More >
Shemini 5778
What is Holy?
A D’var Torah for Shemini
Cantor Sandy Horowitz ’14
In response to gun violence incidents, the press often seeks to provide information about the shooter in an attempt to determine motive. Was he a Muslim terrorist or a white disgruntled employee, a bully or bullied, a cop or a criminal, or a known sociopath who slipped through the cracks of law enforcement bureaucracy? All have been true. And no matter who they are, the outcome of their actions remains unquestionably disastrous.
Similarly, with regard to this week’s Torah reading, there are numerous possible explanations for the actions of Aaron’s sons Nadav and Avihu, who bring strange, unsanctioned sacrificial fire to God, and die as a result. In the context of the culture that God is establishing for the ancient Israelites, theirs is a serious transgression.
This disturbing event occurs following a lengthy, detailed description of the sacrifices offered at the newly Read More >
Pesah 5778
Shir haShirim and the Kodesh Kodashim: Two Holies of Holies
A D’var Torah for Pesah
by Rabbi Jill Hammer
I once had the privilege of being at a Torah service led by rabbi and chantress Shefa Gold. At the service, she unrolled a scroll of the words of Shir haShirim, a scroll she had created to make the point that the Song of Songs is its own Torah. Rabbi Akiva famously said that: “all the scriptures are holy, and the Song of Songs is the Holy of Holies!” (Mishnah Yadayim 3:5). One might say that just as we approach the Holy of Holies during the autumn new year via the story of the high priest’s entry into the sanctum during the Yom Kippur ritual, so we approach the Holy of Holies at the spring new year (Pesah) via the Song of Songs. There is a long-standing practice to read the section of Leviticus describing Read More >
Parashat Tzav, 5778
A D’var Torah for Tzav
by Rabbi Heidi Hoover ’11
This week’s Torah portion, Tzav, continues detailed discussion of the sacrifices, though this week’s text is addressed to the priests and focuses on their duties, while last week’s text was addressed to the Israelite people.
We frequently talk about how alien animal sacrifice is to us now, and it can be very difficult to feel any affinity to these Torah portions. But the Israelites did get something out of the sacrificial system, and one thing I believe they got is something that we still want today. I suggest that the sacrificial system supported communal life.
Everyone knew the rules and followed them. When a person came to make a sacrifice, it was not something they did alone. A person would bring the animal and give it to the priest—so there were at least two people involved. Read More >
Parashat Vayikra 5778
A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayikra
Rabbi Bruce Alpert, ’11
Egg yolks, oil, water, flour, sugar and yeast. For nearly twenty years I have been adding these ingredients to my bread machine on Friday morning. When I return home in the afternoon, I have dough with which to braid and bake challah.
The bakers among you may notice that I have left out an ingredient; by far the smallest of all. Yet that one teaspoon of salt is the difference between a challah that tastes rich and sweet and one that is poor and flat.
What got me thinking about challah and salt are the detailed descriptions of meal offerings and their preparation in this week’s Torah portion, Vayikra. I was struck particularly with this verse: “You shall season every offering of meal with salt; you shall not omit from your meal offering the salt of your covenant with God; with all your offerings you must Read More >
March 8, 2018 – Parashat VaYakhel-Pekudei, 5778
You Gotta Have Heart…or Do You?
A D’var Torah for VaYakhel-Pekudei
by Rabbi Rena H. Kieval, ’06
The great communal building project of the mishkan, the wilderness tabernacle, finally gets underway in this week’s double Torah portion, and the participants who craft, create and assemble it are reportedly full of heart. The Hebrew word for heart –lev – and its variants libo, libam, and so on, are repeated at least a dozen times. We read of the generous of heart – nedivei lev (Ex. 35:5, 35:22), who donate their jewels and fine fabrics for the structure; the wise of heart – hokhmei lev (Ex. 35:10, 35:25), who are skilled and able to share their artistic talents, and their building and organizational abilities. We read too of the nesi’ei lev (Ex. 35:21, 35:26) those with uplifted hearts, or perhaps, those whose hearts have lifted them up to participate. The hearts of this community are so overflowing Read More >
Parashat Ki Tissa, 5778
Society’s Golden Calves
A D’var Torah for Ki Tissa
by Rabbi Irwin Huberman, ’10
While attending a conference last year on future trends in Judaism, one of the presenters – a rabbi – told the story of how he had aroused the fury of one of his congregants.
One evening, as he taught a class on the ethics of technology, his phone began to ping.
Because his device had been tucked in his jacket hanging in the back of the room, he was not able to immediately respond to the text messages.
After his lecture ended, when he had the opportunity to check his messages, he realized that his lack of immediate response had triggered the rage of a usually mild mannered congregant.
“Rabbi, can I ask you something?” the first text read.
“Rabbi, I need your advice on something,” the next message read.
And then a series of messages followed in rapid fire: “Where are you?”
“Why are you ignoring me?”
“What Read More >
Parashat Tetzaveh, 5778
Breastplate of Judgment
A D’var Torah for Tetzaveh
Rabbi Lenny Levin
“You shall make a breastplate of judgment…set in it mounted stones in four rows…corresponding to the names of the sons of Israel” (Ex. 28:15–21).
We know from experience how the abstract ideals of religion are embodied in the sacred objects that become familiar through repeated contact and serve as foci of our sense of holiness. Thus, the implements of the Tabernacle — the Ark, the Menorah, the curtain, the table, and the two tablets of the Ten Commandments — became templates for the artwork of the Synagogue, taking varied forms over the two thousand years of synagogue architecture.
One of the more puzzling of these sacred objects is the “breastplate of judgment” described in Chapter 28 of Exodus. It is associated with the “ephod,” a chest-garment of woven gold, blue, purple and crimson yarns, and with the Urim and Thummim, used in oracular consultations. It is Read More >
Parashat Terumah, 5778
A D’var Torah for Parashat Mishpatim
by Rabbi Isaac Mann
This week’s Torah portion deals with the construction of the Mishkan (the Tabernacle) and the various vessels to be placed in it or in front of it. Most of the vessels were to have rings built on their sides through which rods or staves would be inserted that would allow for the Priests or the Levites to transport them easily from one encampment to another during the sojourn of the Israelites in the Desert. In particular, four vessels were to have these rings adjoined to them: the Holy Ark (Ex. 25:12-15), the Table of the Lehem ha-Panim (Ex. 25:26-28), the Altar for Sacrifices (Ex. 27:4-7), and the Incense Altar (Ex. 30::4-5).
Of the above vessels, only one had a special instruction that applied to it and to none of the others, namely, that the staves must remain in the rings permanently. That vessel is the Read More >
Parashat Mishpatim, 5778
A D’var Torah for Mishpatim
by, Cantor Sandy Horowitz, ’14
Parashat Mishpatim contains over fifty laws covering a range of subjects, which are related to the Israelite people by God through Moses. Having just received the ten commandments in the previous Torah portion, now come the details.
The first law in Mishapatim states, “Should you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall work [for] six years, and in the seventh [year], he shall go out to freedom without charge” (Exodus 21:2). Slavery is certainly a hot topic for the newly freed Israelites. While not abolishing slavery, this and other related laws insert an insistence on humanity with regard to the treatment of others. This ethical backbone is reinforced as we read, twice in this portion alone, about the treatment of the stranger: “And you shall not mistreat a stranger, nor shall you oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Ex 22:20). “And you shall not oppress Read More >
Parashat Yitro, 5778
A D’var Torah for Parashat Yitro
by Rabbi Jill Hammer, PhD
As I write this, I am thinking of a particular moment in my life, when I was about to lead a large ceremony. A few years prior at the same ceremony, I’d been dehydrated and nearly passed out while giving a D’var Torah. So I was nervous. Things were running late, which made me even more nervous. As preparations concluded and the moment to begin arrived, I must have looked very anxious indeed. An elder—a wise rabbi who had led many rituals—came over to me and looked me up and down. “You’re going to be fine,” she said. And I was.
I am wondering if Yitro came to Moshe in the wilderness, just before Moshe’s big moment, for that very same reason: to tell him he was going Read More >
Parashat Beshalah, 5778
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Parashat Bo, 5778
A D’var Torah for Parashat Bo
By Rabbi Bruce Alpert
The exodus from Egypt is understood in different ways: as a miraculous deliverance, as an escape from slavery, as a journey to freedom. Reading again this week’s parashah, Bo, I came away with a different understanding: as a divorce.
I took this understanding from the opening verse of Chapter 11: “The Lord said to Moses, “One more plague shall I bring upon Pharaoh and upon Egypt; after that he shall send you forth from here,” k’shalkho kalah gareish y’gareish etkhem mi-zeh. What struck me about that final phrase was the juxtaposition of the words kalah and gareish. The former can mean bride and the latter, the verb meaning “cast out,” is the root for “divorce.” I initially read that last phrase to mean “like his sending out a bride, he shall certainly cast you out from here.” Rashi, citing Onkelos, tells us that kalah actually Read More >
Parashat Va’era, 5778
Exodus: God, Women, and Dr. King
A D’var for Parashat Va’era
by Rabbi Rena H. Kieval ’06
“Exodus: Gods and Kings.” That is the name of Hollywood’s most recent major film version of the seminal story of our people. The title resonates with our parashah, as we follow the grand showdown of majestic force between God, capital G, and gods, lower case g, the gods of the Egyptians, and the mighty King Pharaoh. Gods and Kings. We see in this Torah story how Gods and Kings make history. We see the dramatic confrontations which culminate in the defeat of the oppressor King Pharaoh, and the liberation of the Israelites, God’s people.
As we enter into the thick of this spectacular drama, however, we should note that the Torah leads up to the story with a prologue that begins the Exodus narrative with a somewhat different framework. The stage was set in last week’s parashah, Shemot; it reminds us that history is made not only by Gods and Read More >
Parashat Shemot, 5778
The Power of Your Hebrew Name
A D’var for Parashat Shemot
by Rabbi Irwin Huberman ’10
A popular website which monitors facts relating to pregnancy, birth, and babies recently released its list of the most popular baby names for 2017.
According to this site, BabyCenter, top names for newborn boys were Jackson, Liam, Noah, and Aiden. For baby girls the most popular choices were Sophia, Olivia, Emma, and Ava.
Those who study these trends also note that names like Asher, Ezra, Atticus, and LeBron are on the upswing, along with Cora, Isabella, Amelia, and Charlotte.
Those are the secular choices. But what about Judaism? Although few statistics are kept within the Jewish world, we can remain pretty confident that worldwide there was no significant change between 2017 and 2016, or for that matter, for hundreds of previous years.
This is largely because, within Judaism, we attach a unique meaning to names. The Kabbalistic tradition links word for a person’s soul – Neshama – Read More >
Parashat Vayigash, 5778
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Parashat Miketz, 5778
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Parashat Vayeshev, 5778
The Dreams of Joseph and Solomon
A D’var Torah for Vayeshev
Rabbi Jill Hammer
Many have suggested that events in the Book of Genesis are intertextual with events in the Book of Samuel. For example, the ketonet pasim, the colorful striped coat that Joseph wears as his brothers betray him and sell him into slavery, has a direct relationship with the ketonet pasim, the colorful striped coat that Tamar daughter of David wears as her brother Amnon betrays and rapes her. In fact, in Tanakh there are the only two “striped coats” (the Hebrew word pas may mean “to divide into parts”).
Both coats are torn. Joseph’s brothers tear his in an effort to fake his death, and Tamar tears hers in mourning for what has happened to her. Joseph and Tamar, both betrayed by siblings, must be read in light of one another. It is not even clear which text we should read first. As Read More >
Parashat Vayishlah, 5778
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Parashat Vayetzei, 5778
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Parashat Toldot, 5778
We’ll Always Have Parents: 2017
A D’var Torah for Toldot
by Rabbi Rena H. Kieval
In the classic movie Casablanca, the ill-fated lovers played by Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman share these words of comfort: “We’ll always have Paris.” A playful poem by Mary Jo Salter uses that line to make a point. The poem, titled, “We’ll Always Have Parents,” notes that, “We’ll always have them…they’re in our baggage.” The poem calls to mind what a wise and learned person once told me: that no matter how old we are, most of us shape our lives in response to our parents. We may define ourselves in a positive way by who our parents were, and what they taught us, and we may also define ourselves against who our parents were, and what they taught us. Most of us are driven and shaped by mixed legacies. Whatever those legacies are, “we’ll always have parents.”
Parashat Toldot reflects this Read More >
Parshat Hayei Sara, 5778
| Hospitality: Judaism’s Family Business by Rabbi Irwin Huberman |
| It was twenty years ago that my wife and I learned from two young children one of the most important values within all of Judaism.
It’s a lesson embodied in this week’s Parashah, Hayei Sarah-and it may well be a central pillar of what has allowed Jewish tradition to endure and evolve over thousands of years. I remember that chilly winter night, long before I entered the rabbinate, when the local Chabad rabbi invited my wife and me for Shabbat dinner. We were obviously nervous. Would we say something wrong? Would we stumble when asked to recite the Sabbath blessings? These questions and a dozen more like them seemed to fill the air as we made our way up our hosts’ driveway. As we approached the front steps, the door swung open, and out flew two boys, aged nine and eleven, who grabbed our gloves and coats and hats before we’d Read More > |
Parshat VaYera, 5778
| by Rabbi Isaac Mann |
| I would like to share with you a very insightful ethical interpretation of a midrashic comment that I heard in the name of Rabbi Avraham Yaakov Pam, who was the Rosh ha-Yeshiva of Mesivta Torah Vodaath in the latter part of the 20th century.
Commenting on the verse in Genesis 21:6, which describes Sarah’s reaction to her giving birth to Isaac at the age of 90 (“G-d has brought me laughter; whoever hears about this will laugh with me”), the Midrash adds that many barren women became pregnant (literally “were remembered by G-d”) along with her, many sick were healed along with her, many prayers were answered along with her, for there was much laughter (i.e. joy) in the world (quoted by Rashi ad loc.). The Midrash is apparently responding to the question of why would everyone who heard about Sarah’s birth erupt into joyful laughter. Surely Read More > |
Parshat Lekh Lekha
On Being a Blessing
A Dvar Torah for Lekh Lekha
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz
“I’m on the 5th floor and my window is open
and someone outside sneezed so i shouted ‘BLESS U’ out the window
and he said “THANK YOU BUILDING”
–From the twitter feed of Jonny Sun
In Parashat Lekh Lekha when Abram is called to go forth from his home God tells him, “And I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will aggrandize your name, and [you shall] be a blessing” (Genesis 12:2).
What is the significance of God saying Abram will “be a blessing”?
One might assume that the one chosen by God to “be a blessing” would be pure of character and righteous in action. But this is not Abraham (as Abram is later renamed).
True, he is no doubt considered a blessing by his nephew Lot after he rescues Lot from captivity in Genesis Chapter 14. Read More >
Parshat Noah
A D’var Torah for Noah
By Rabbi Jill Hammer
Recently in one of my classes at AJR, my students and I noticed an interesting biblical paradox. In Parashat Noah, once the flood has subsided, Noah makes a thanksgiving offering to YHWH. YHWH smells the pleasing odor of the offering and offers a commitment: “As long as the earth endures, planting and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22). In return for Noah’s gratitude for being saved, the Divine promises that the cyclical patterns of nature, the basic foundation upon which human life rests, shall not cease. Even before making a covenant with Noah or offering commands about human life, YHWH promises not to destroy the earth but to allow its cycles to continue. This is a great blessing to the human beings who have been tasked with tilling and tending the earth: “l’ovdah uleshomrah” (Genesis Read More >
Parshat Bereshit
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The Ultimate Framing Narrative
A Dvar Torah for Bereshit
By Rabbi Lenny Levin
“In the beginning God created heavens and earth.” (Gen. 1:1)
“Who am I?” The answer to this question takes a narrative form. I am [fill in the name]. I grew up in such-and-such a family, went to such-and-such schools, have had such-and-such experiences and accomplishments. I belong to [one or more religious-ethnic backgrounds]. My [great-]-grandparents came here in 19xx. Our group had a history of so-many centuries in such-and-such a place. My personal narrative is embedded in family and group narratives, extending backwards through receding horizons.
Our teacher Rabbi Neil Gillman said it’s all narrative. We live our lives as narrative. When asked to tell someone (a date, an employer, a therapist, a chance encounter) something Read More >
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Parashat Hukkat
On the Threshold of Eternity
A Dvar Torah for Hukkat
by Rabbi Len Levin
“He who touches the corpse of any human being shall be unclean for seven days…” (Num. 19:11)
For an entire lifetime, one builds up a network of interactions with others in society, a network comprising commerce, family, edifices of knowledge, productive endeavor, life in the public square, a living, breathing complex of order, structure, creative output. When one dies, one takes leave of that world of social interaction and goes on a private journey to we know not where, a mysterious realm where all the bonds of this world are dissolved.
The mourner stands on the threshold of these two realms. Being touched by the recently departed, the mourner feels different. S/he cannot go back to participating at once in the activities of this world as if nothing has happened. S/he must linger a while in the liminal space between this Read More >
Parashat Korah
by Rabbi Isaac Mann
Much ink has been spilled on trying to explain what motivated Korach and his followers to rebel against Moses and Aaron, which is the main story in this week’s Torah portion. Was it jealousy, envy, desire for honor or power, dissatisfaction with Moses’ leadership, or maybe all of the above?
Interestingly, as if the above are not enough, we also find other explanations of a more halakhic nature playing a role in the dispute between Korach and Moses. The Midrash (Midrash Tanhuma, beginning of the parashah), part of which is quoted by Rashi (ad loc.), suggests that Korach began his dispute with Moses by summoning the Sanhedrin (i.e. the religious leadership at the time) and asking them to rule on whether a tallit that is entirely dyed with tekheilet (a kind of bluish-purple dye) still needs tzitzit consisting of only one tekheilet fringe on each corner. When the issue was Read More >
Parashat Shelah
by Cantor Sandy Horowitz
What’s in a Name?
Parashat Shelah tells the story of twelve spies sent by Moses to scout out the land of Canaan that has been promised by God to the Israelite people. Upon their return, ten of the twelve report that the enemy is too great and the land unconquerable, thereby instilling doubt and fear among the Israelites. Only two of the spies, Caleb and Joshua, remain faithful to God’s promise of a successful outcome.
The Torah portion begins by listing the names of the spies, representatives from each of the twelve tribes of Israel. Joshua, future leader of the Israelite people, is an unassuming fifth from among the twelve: “From the tribe of Ephraim, Hoshea the son of Nun” (Numbers 13:8).
Numbers 13:16 reads, “These are the names of the men which Moses sent to spy out the land; and Moses called Hoshea the son of Nun Joshua/Yehoshua.” Without Read More >
Parashat Beha’alotkha
by Rabbi Michael Pitkowsky
This week’s parashah begins with a description of the installation and function of the menorah in the Tabernacle.
“Speak to Aaron and say to him: When you set up the lamps, the seven lamps shall give light in front of the lampstand. Aaron did so; he set up its lamps to give light in front of the lampstand, as the LORD had commanded Moses. Now this was how the lampstand was made, out of hammered work of gold. From its base to its flowers, it was hammered work; according to the pattern that the LORD had shown Moses, so he made the lampstand.” (Numbers 8:2-4)
In the detailed instructions for the construction of the Tabernacle that are found in the Book of Exodus one can find the specifics of how the menorah was to be constructed, and what we have in Numbers seems to be the final description of how it Read More >
Parashat Naso
by Rabbi Michael Pitkowsky
This week’s parashah contains one of the most detailed descriptions of a Biblical ritual in the entire Torah. Numbers 5:11-31 contains a description of the Sotah ritual. When a husband suspected his wife of being unfaithful she was subjected to an ordeal that would prove either her innocence or guilt. In addition to the description of the Sotah ritual found in the Torah, there is a very detailed tractate in the Mishnah (early 3rd century) that goes into even further detail.
The Sotah ritual has been subject to much scholarly research, some compared this ritual to other Ancient Near Eastern ordeals while other focused on unavoidable questions regarding gender and patriarchy. I would like to discuss the approach to the Sotah taken by Ishai Rosen-Zvi in his book The Mishnaic Sotah Ritual: Temple, Gender and Midrash.
Rosen-Zvi begins by asking the following questions:
Why does the Mishnah reformulate a ritual that has Read More >
Parashat Bemidbar
Parashat Bemidbar: Tribalism or Multitribalism?
Rabbi Jill Hammer
The first parashah in the Book of Numbers (or in Hebrew Bemidbar) makes a significant point of listing the census numbers of each tribe (adult males able to go to war) as well as the leaders of each tribe (hence the moniker Book of Numbers). The parashah goes on to list where each tribe camps in relationship to the Tabernacle: Judah, Issachar and Zebulun on the east, Reuben, Simeon, and Gad on the south, Ephraim, Manasseh, and Benjamin on the west, and Dan, Asher, and Naftali on the north, with Levi camped in the center. Then the parashah details the particular duties of each subclan of the tribe of Levi as well as their census numbers. It’s as if we’ve discovered an Iron Age accounting tablet. Aside from the tale of the elevation of the Levites, there isn’t a story or a law to be found Read More >
Parashat Behar-Behukotai
A Society of Free Landholders
by Rabbi Len Levin
“You shall proclaim release [liberty] throughout the land for all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you: each of you shall return to his holding and each of you shall return to his family.” (Leviticus 25:9)
Three years ago I discussed how the Jubilee law served as a beacon to both the American republic and the reborn Jewish homeland, informing their visions of liberty and economic opportunity for all citizens. (See Levin, Dvar Torah Behar 2014.)
To review: “In order to have a chance to remain free, people needed to have a material sufficiency to earn an independent livelihood. Hence, at periodic intervals — every fifty years — the primary source of wealth, the land itself, was to be redistributed to the ancestral families to which it had presumably been apportioned at the original Israelite conquest.”
The Israeli philosopher Eliezer Schweid, in his book, Philosophy Read More >
Parashat Emor
by Rabbi Michael Pitkowsky
This week’s parashah is a priestly delight. It’s filled with numerous teachings that were relevant to the lives of priests, kohanim, in the past, and for some kohanim, still today. Many people, not only kohanim, are challenged by some of the restrictions that were placed on the priests. Along with the numerous benefits that came along with the priesthood, there were also prohibitions, some related to whom they could marry, while others addressed certain physical characteristics that disqualified a priest from performing his priestly duties.
“The LORD spoke further to Moses: Speak to Aaron and say: No man of your offspring throughout the ages who has a defect shall be qualified to offer the food of his God. No one at all who has a defect shall be qualified: no man who is blind, or lame, or has a limb too short or too long; no man who has a Read More >
Parashat Aharei Mot-Kedoshim
by Cantor Sandy Horowitz
Parashat Aharei Mot-Kedoshim: A Look Back
Max: Aaron has asked us to divide into groups and share our reflections about what we heard from Moses today. So many laws! I lost track after fifty.
Hannah: “You, who are on the road, must have a code that you can live by….”*
Max: What?
Hannah: I heard that in a dream once.
Shira: How long will this take? Miriam’s doing folk-dancing tonight and I promised her I’d bring my timbrel…
Shmuel: What’s with all those Ani Adonai (“I am Adonai”)s? He kept repeating it.
Max: Perhaps it helps us remember a Higher Purpose whenever we consider these laws.
Shmuel: Or maybe he’s still mad about the golden calf…
Max: I was struck by hearing the laws regarding land: we’re commanded to leave the corners of our fields for the poor and hungry, fruit-trees grow unpicked for three years and then we sacrifice the first fruits before we can Read More >
Parashat Tazria-Metzora
The double parshiyot of this week’s Torah reading, Tazria-Metzora, are for many commentators a challenge. Many parshiyot in the Book of Leviticus are challenging, but much of this week’s Torah reading reads like a zombie apocalypse in which people are still concerned whether they are pure or impure.
One theme that keeps returning throughout the reading is that of isolation and loneliness. Law after law describes how people were to be isolated from the rest of the Israelite encampment and whose entry into the sanctuary was forbidden.
She shall remain in a state of blood purification for thirty-three days: she shall not touch any consecrated thing, nor enter the sanctuary until her period of purification is completed. (Lev. 12:4)
But if it is a white discoloration on the skin of his body which does not appear to be deeper than the skin and the hair in it has not turned white, the priest shall isolate Read More >
Parashat Shemini
by Rabbi Michael Pitkowsky
This week’s parashah begins with Moses’s instructions to Aaron, his sons, and the elders of Israel:
On the eighth day Moses called Aaron and his sons, and the elders of Israel. He said to Aaron: “Take a calf of the herd for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering, without blemish, and bring them before the LORD…” (Leviticus 9:1-2)
Much of the parashah consists of instructions regarding the sacrifices and other regulations regarding dietary restrictions. Near the beginning of the parashah Moses relayed the following instructions to the Children of Israel. “Moses said: “This is what the LORD has commanded that you do, that the Presence of the LORD may appear to you.” (Leviticus 9:6)
The midrash Yalkut Shimoni (13-14th century) brings the following interpretation (par. 521):
Moses said to Israel: Remove that [evil] urge from your hearts in order that you all be of one feeling of awe and Read More >
Hol Hamoed Pesah
Miriam the Healer
Rabbi Jill Hammer
As we approach the seventh day of Pesach, when we read the narrative of crossing of the Sea, I am thinking of the prophetess Miriam, who dances and sings to celebrate the crossing and the victory of YHWH. At my own seder, I have long had a cup of Miriam, filled with fresh water to represent the well of water that followed Miriam through the wilderness, quenching the thirst of the wandering people (cf: Babylonian Talmud, Taanit 9a). This custom, invented by contemporary Jewish women, gives me great pleasure, as Miriam is a role model of mine. Yet I did not know how intimately Miriam is associated with protection and healing, and with the salt water of the sea.
Recently, as I have read about Sephardic Jewish women’s prayers and rituals, I have learned that the veneration of Miriam is especially deep in Sephardic Jewish traditions of Read More >
Passover
by Rabbi Isaac Mann
One of the key principles that the Haggadah follows in recounting the story of the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt is “matchil be’genut u’mesayim be’shevah” (literally, “one begins with the disgrace and ends with the glory”), i.e. one starts with the negative or low point of our history and concludes with the positive. What is the negative? On this Rav and Shmuel disagree, as recorded in the Talmud (Pesahim 116a) – “Rav said that one should begin by saying: At first our forefathers were idol worshippers, before concluding with words of glory. And Shmuel said: The disgrace with which one should begin his answer is: We were slaves.
It would appear that by following this order, whether according to Rav or Shmuel, we are focusing our attention on the glorious outcome of the Exodus story, namely our emancipation from Egypt and achievement of freedom. By starting out with what we were in the beginning, Read More >
Parashat Vayikra
by Rabbi Len Levin
Moses: A Leader with a Small Ego
A Dvar Torah for Vayikra
There are two peculiarities in the opening of Leviticus that elude the English reader.
The first is that the first clause is missing a subject. Vayikra el Moshe — “and he called to Moses.” Who called? The kabbalists suppose it is an unusual part of God – maybe “Ehyeh” (I will Be) instead of the accustomed “the Lord.” Modern scholars suggest that it shows continuity with the previous passage in Exodus Chapter 40, “Moses was unable to enter the Tent of Meeting because the Presence of the Lord filled the Tablernacle…so He (i.e. the Lord) called to Moses from the Tent of Meeting.”
The second peculiarity is that the word Vayikra (he called) is written with a small aleph as its last letter. There are a number of places in the written Torah where letters are written either smaller Read More >
Parashat Vayakhel-Pekudei
by Cantor Sandy Horowitz
Ancestors. We begin praying the Amidah by invoking them: as we acknowledge the presence of God, we do so by stating that this is also the God of our patriarchs. In recent times, more liberal streams of Judaism added the matriarchs; as a woman it is comforting to read the names of Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah alongside (well actually, following) Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
It can be an equally meaningful though different experience to pray from a traditional siddur in which our maternal ancestors have not been added, this too. I still recite their names after reading the printed names of the patriarchs, as a conscious acknowledgement of their textual invisibility. It is an opportunity as well to reflect on the broader notion of inclusion and exclusion.
Ancestors. Parashat Vayakhel-Pekudei provides a rare opportunity to acknowledge the entire community of ancient Israelite women, our collective female ancestors who are mentioned here Read More >
Parshat Ki Tisa
by Rabbi Michael Pitkowsky
This week’s parashah, Ki Tisa, includes one of the most dramatic episodes in the entire Torah, the Golden Calf. The description found in the Torah has rebellion, passion, emotion, idolatry, and violence, all of the ingredients needed for a good story. I would like to focus on something that happened after the calf was constructed and Moses descended from Mount Sinai.
Moses saw that the people were out of control—since Aaron had let them get out of control—so that they were a menace to any who might oppose them. Moses stood up in the gate of the camp and said, “Whoever is for the LORD, come here!” And all the Levites rallied to him. He said to them, “Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: Each of you put sword on thigh, go back and forth from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay brother, neighbor, and kin.” Read More >
Parashat Tetzaveh-Shabbat Zachor-Purim
What It Means To Be Godfearing: Parashat Tetzaveh/Shabbat Zachor/Purim
Rabbi Jill Hammer
Remember what Amalek did to you on the way when you left Egypt; how he happened upon you on the road and harassed you at the rear, all the stragglers that followed after you, when you were tired and weary, and he did not fear God. (Deut. 25:17-18)
The sages connect the Book of Esther to the story of Amalek, the tribe that attacked the Hebrews as they left Egypt. Deuteronomy identifies the people of Amalek with a particular kind of evil: attack on the vulnerable. Amalek does not attack the warriors of the Hebrews; he attacks weary, tired refugees from Egypt at the rear of the line: the infirm, the old, the parents with children who cannot walk quickly. Amalek demonstrates a complete lack of empathy for people who have suffered and have no strength to fight back, seeing in this situation Read More >
