Parashat D’varim

By Rabbi Kaya Stern-Kaufman

This week’s Torah portionÂ “ D’varimÂ “ opens the book of Deuteronomy, throughout which Moses delivers an exhaustive farewell speech to the people of Israel, recounting their history, reviewing many of the laws given at Sinai and adding new laws for a future life in the promised land. The portion begins with the words Eleh ha-d’varim, meaning: these are the words, that Moses spoke. From this opening statement is derived the name for the fifth book of TorahÂ “ D’varim /Deuteronomy.

Many Sages and rabbis in our tradition point out that when Moses was first initiated into the role of God’s emissary to Pharaoh, he resisted the task, claiming Lo ish d’varim anochiÂ “ “I am not a man of words.“ And yet, forty years later Moses has indeed become a man of words. In D’varim Rabba (a tenth-century collection of midrash compiled in the tenth century from much earlier material), the Rabbis explain Read More >

By ahsilver|2012-07-26T13:17:50-04:00July 26, 2012|

Parashat Mattot-Massei

Divided We Stand, United We Fall: Not Much Has Changed

I recall the period following the ’67 war when many Jews, religious and not, swelled with pride, kvelled, at what “our” tiny nation in the desert, surrounded by enemies, had accomplished. Some of us, so inspired by the military miracle, made aliyah, moved there permanently.

Notwithstanding the enthusiasm, the vast majority of Jews remained in their “native” lands. Little could induce most of us in the USA to emigrate because we had successfully assimilated and felt secure here.

Today about half the Jews in the world live in Eretz Israel and the other half outside it. These statistics cause some Israelis to delegitimize the loyalty of those of us outside. But the truth is that it’s always been this way.

The first of this week’s double parashah, Mattot, “Tribes,” is the earliest depiction of this conflict, as two of the tribes, the Gadites and Reubenites, ask Read More >

By ahsilver|2012-07-19T17:13:30-04:00July 19, 2012|

Parashat Pinhas

Â By Rabbi Isaac Mann

The beginning of Parashat Pinhas seems out of place. We have here some details of a story that is basically recounted at the end of the previous parashah of Balak, and instead of finishing the story there, some of the details are left out and only filled in at the beginning of the next parashah. Why the need to spread the rather brief story over two parashiyot?

To elaborate, at the end of Balak, we are told of the Israelites engaging openly in an orgy of idolatry and immorality with Moabite/Midianite women with whom they had recently come into contact as they were approaching the Land of Canaan. Among the offenders was the head of a prominent family (nasi bet-av) of Shimon. The brazenness of their sinful activity sparked God’s anger against His people and resulted in the outbreak of a devastating plague. 24,000 people were killed until Pinhas, the Read More >

By Rabbi Isaac Mann|2012-07-12T10:32:16-04:00July 12, 2012|

Parashat Balak

Out of Left Field: The Portion of Balak
By Rabbi Bob Freedman

Just at a point in the narrative of Numbers when the Israelites have begun to fight for the land that God has promised them comes the story of Bil’am. It seems to say, “Dear reader, maybe at this point in our story you fear that Israel is not doing well. Yes, they can fight, but at spiritual constancy or keeping purity of purpose, their record is truly dismal. Yet don’t despair; take a step back to see the bigger picture. Even now on the far heights of Mt. Pisgah God is readying the seer Bil’am, against his will, to bring blessing on Israel.”

This Bil’am story is odd. It is by far the longest of the very few narratives in the Torah that are not about events directly experienced by the generation of the Exodus or about their history. The Israelites camped in Read More >

By ahsilver|2012-07-05T10:04:39-04:00July 5, 2012|

Parashat Hukkat

The Heifer’s Mysteries: Death and Purification

Â The law of the red heifer (Numbers, Chapter 19) is offered in the Jewish tradition as the paradigm of a hok, an arbitrary law whose reasons are known only to God, but surpass human understanding. A red heifer is slaughtered and burned to ashes, then its ashes are combined with pure water to be used in the purification ceremony of people unclean by reason of contact with the dead. The final purification ceremony would take place only after a seven day waiting period following contact with the dead. What could possibly be the rationale of such a ritual?

The 1^st-century Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai, after delivering to a gentile an explanation by analogy with exorcism of a demon, was challenged by his students: “You deflected him with a reed! What would you say to us?” He replied: “The dead body does not defile, nor do the waters Read More >

By Rabbi Len Levin|2012-06-28T14:09:24-04:00June 28, 2012|

Parashat Korah

My synagogue is presently undergoing seismic change. We will be leaving the building we have owned and occupied for about the last four years. We will be seeking to move to a more urban location, a move that bucks the persistent trend of local congregations in my hometown to move further out into the suburbs; a trend that either is driven by the desire for shuls to go where the Jews are, or, a somewhat self-fulfilling prophecy of Jews going where the shuls are built… or not. Add to the mix my own entry into the kehilah (community) about one year ago with my pluralistic (read, AJR) sensibilities.

This change has precipitated some modicum of turmoil, and fairly strong push-back. Some have resorted to personal attack. In moving the shul forward I continue to ponder what it is those who are fighting these changes are fighting against. Likewise with this week’s parashah I Read More >

By Doug Alpert|2012-06-21T14:03:38-04:00June 21, 2012|

Parashat Beha’alot’kha

Someone gives you a gift and says, “Here, I was saving this for just the right moment.” That is what I love about discovering new insights in the Torah; it was there all along just waiting for the right moment to be revealed. The first paper I wrote in rabbinical school was based on a few verses from this week’s parashah, Beha’alotkha; Numbers 11:24-29 to be exact (see these verses below). Consumed with both the concept, reality and authenticity of prophecy as I was at that time, here was a treasure trove of material. We do not sometimes see the words that can change our lives, we are not given the meaning until it means something to US. Well, that’s the whole point, that’s why we keep at it. Now, after years of rabbinic training and more years of life experience, I see something I missed back then; what I could not Read More >

By ahsilver|2012-06-07T22:39:39-04:00June 7, 2012|

Parashat Naso

“And now, gentlemen,” said d’Artagnan, without stopping to explain his conduct to Porthos, “All for one, one for all–that is our motto, is it not?”
“And yet–” said Porthos.
“Hold out your hand and swear!” cried Athos and Aramis at once.
Overcome by example, grumbling to himself, nevertheless, Porthos stretched out his hand, and the four friends repeated with one voice the formula dictated by d’Artagnan:Â “All for one, one for all.”
From The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas, Chapter 9.

When I speak to the staff at the regional medical center on the subject of treating Jewish patients, one of the first things I say to them, is that Jews, like all of their patients, have to be treated as individuals.Â For we come in different denominations, with differing views on what our tradition teaches.Â This has been true for centuries.Â The Pharisees held that the soul lives on after death; the Sadducees held the opposite.Â Read More >

By ahsilver|2012-06-04T15:39:54-04:00June 4, 2012|

Shavuot

Shavuot: A Voice that Does Not Cease

By Rabbi Len Levin

“The Lord came down upon Mount Sinai” (Exodus 19:20)

I love blintzes and cheesecake. The rabbis based the custom of eating dairy foods on Shavuot on the verse: “Honey and milk are under your tongue” (Song of Songs 4:11). But what are we celebrating? What really happened? Did God really speak to the Israelites, as it describes in the Bible? And how?

“Moses and Elijah did not ascend to heaven, nor did the Glory descend to earth.” Is this a modern skeptic speaking? No, this is the dictum of the second-century Rabbi Yose, recorded in the rabbinic midrash Mekhilta on Exodus (Bahodesh 4), and cited in Abraham Joshua Heschel’s major work Heavenly Torah As Refracted through the Generations (page 350).

It was Heschel’s amazing achievement to show how much flexibility the Talmudic rabbis exercised in interpreting the Biblical narratives of revelation, and the whole concept of Read More >

By Rabbi Len Levin|2012-05-24T21:01:33-04:00May 24, 2012|

Parashat Behar-Behukotai

By Rabbi Ariann Weitzman

“It should not be believed that all the beings exist for the sake of the existence of humanity. On the contrary, all the other beings too have been intended for their own sakes, and not for the sake of something else” (Maimonides, Guide for the Perplexed, 3:13).

This week’s double portion elaborates on the laws of the sabbatical and Jubilee years, detailing the extreme punishment Israel will suffer if the sabbatical years are not strictly kept. The parashah opens with the reminder that these laws were given on Sinai, orienting the reader to the centrality and importance of what is to follow. Indeed, these laws must be central to the Torah’s concern, as the texts reminds us we will be removed from our land as a result of failing to abide by them, as it is written in Leviticus 26:43, “The land will be bereft of [the Israelites] and it Read More >

By Rabbi Ariann Weitzman|2012-05-17T19:42:24-04:00May 17, 2012|

All shall unite to do God's will with an open heart.

All shall unite to do God's will with an open heart.

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