Parashat Naso

By Cantor Arnold Saltzman

In Parashat Naso the Priestly Benediction,
also known as Birkat Kohanim is set apart in a
very important manner, punctuated with spaces not
unlike the text for Shirat Hayam ‘ the Song at
the Red Sea – and the Ten Commandments.

The kohanim, the priests, have the power to
bless the people, and this power comes from God and
is channeled through the kohanim, going back
through Aaron and Moses, the Patriarchs, Noah, and
Adam and Chava to whom God gave the
blessing ‘Multiply on Earth.’ (Gen. 1:28) The power to
bless originates in God.

The Priestly Blessing is a three-fold blessing. Some
explain that there are three phrases in order to
remember the patriarchs Avraham, Yitzchak and
Ya’akov, and that God blesses us because of their
merit.

The first blessing begins with ‘Y’varekhekha –
may God bless you’ ‘ understood by one tradition to
refer to one’s possessions. If a Read More >

By ahsilver|2006-06-08T12:45:29-04:00June 8, 2006|

Shavuot

By Jonathan Zimet

On Shavuot we recall, and re-enact, the revelation
event of our history. There, in the desert, we see a
large group of ex-slaves, traveling by foot. Then,
on just three days notice, they experience something
so awesome that it had to transcend our usual
physical senses. Dark clouds, blinding flashes of
light; deafening voices and silent voices.

The account relates: “V’khol ha-`am ro-im et ha-
kolot v?et ha-lapidim“, the entire people saw the
thunder (and fires) (Ex. 20:14). Such an experience
is so overwhelming and transcendent that we cannot
make complete sense of it or translate it with our
usual senses. Similar descriptions have been
reported in prophetic visions and in near-death
experiences, where activity in our physical organs is
largely suspended.

Clearly, our people directly encountered God in what
became the transcendent and defining experience in
our history. God engraved a covenant Read More >

By ahsilver|2006-06-01T07:24:50-04:00June 1, 2006|

Parashat Bemidbar

Counting the Models of Religious Leadership in The Book of Numbers
By Rabbi Rena Kieval

I would like to dedicate this dvar Torah about
religious leadership to my fellow graduates, my
teachers, and all the students at AJR, where
individuals are embarked on this path in so many
different ways and bringing a multiplicity of talents
and roles to the holy work.

What makes a religious leader? In Sefer Va-yikra
(Leviticus) we learned in exhaustive detail about
the roles of the kohanim – priests, whom the
Torah refers to as meshuchim – anointed ones
(Num. 3:3). They are God’s elite religious
functionaries who live apart from the people, who
must meet strict standards of taharah ‘ purity – and who strive for, or symbolize, perfection.

In Sefer Bamidbar (Numbers), which
we begin reading this week, God announces the
selection of another group of religious leaders, the
levi’im – levites. The Torah calls Read More >

By Rabbi Rena Kieval|2006-05-26T14:34:24-04:00May 26, 2006|

Emor

By Rabbi Isaac Mann

The opening verse of the parashah – “Say (emor) to the priests, the sons of Aaron, and you shall say (v’amarta) to them ‘do not defile yourself to someone who died amongst his people,'” (Lev. 21:1)is a major source in the Midrash and Talmud for an important rabbinic teaching. From the redundancy of “emor” “v’amarta” the Rabbis derive that the adult priests must teach their young to follow in their ways, and just as the former are forbidden to be defiled by contact with a corpse so too the young must be instructed to follow this law. Thus the phrase of “and you shall say to them – v’amarta aleihem – applies to the offspring, so as to say, “You shall teach them what I am teaching you.”

By extension, the Rabbis teach us that every adult Jew must teach his children to follow the laws of the Torah. We Read More >

By Rabbi Isaac Mann|2006-05-18T16:19:57-04:00May 18, 2006|

Behar-Behukotai

By Yechiel Buchband

As we open our portions, we may expect to find the
common phrase ‘Adonai spoke to Moses, saying . . .’
But we get a new addition to that phrase:
‘VaY’daber Adonai el-Moshe b’Har-Sinai
Laymor’ (Lev. 25:1). We might well wonder,
weren’t all these many mitzvot in Sefer
VaYikra spoken on/at/near Mt. Sinai? Why add
these words here?

Rashi frames the question a bit differently,
anticipating the first topic dealt with in the portion,
the Sabbatical or sh’mitah year. He asks – in
words so apt that they’ve become a saying in
Hebrew ‘ Mah inyan Sh’mitah eytzel Har-Sinai?!
(What’s the issue of Sh’mitah doing next
to Mt. Sinai; or, what does one thing have to do with
another?) Quoting the midrash in Sifra, Rashi
answers that the words b’Har Sinai come here
to inform us that just as this mitzvah of
Sh’mitah was taught at Sinai along with all its
rules and detailed regulations (here in the Written
Torah, in the next verses), so all the other
mitzvot (which Read More >

By ahsilver|2006-05-18T16:16:19-04:00May 18, 2006|

Bâ€™har-Bâ€™hukotai

By Yechiel Buchband

As we open our portions, we may expect to find the
common phrase ‘Adonai spoke to Moses, saying . . .’
But we get a new addition to that phrase:
‘VaY’daber Adonai el-Moshe b’Har-Sinai
Laymor’ (Lev. 25:1). We might well wonder,
weren’t all these many mitzvot in Sefer
VaYikra spoken on/at/near Mt. Sinai? Why add
these words here?

Rashi frames the question a bit differently,
anticipating the first topic dealt with in the portion,
the Sabbatical or sh’mitah year. He asks – in
words so apt that they’ve become a saying in
Hebrew ‘ Mah inyan Sh’mitah eytzel Har-Sinai?!
(What’s the issue of Sh’mitah doing next
to Mt. Sinai; or, what does one thing have to do with
another?) Quoting the midrash in Sifra, Rashi
answers that the words b’Har Sinai come here
to inform us that just as this mitzvah of
Sh’mitah was taught at Read More >

By ahsilver|2006-05-18T16:16:19-04:00May 18, 2006|

Passover 2006

You! Open Up for Them!
By Rabbi David Greenstein

One of the famous sections of the traditional Haggadah’the Passover discussion of the Exodus that takes place at the seder’is the description of the questions of the Four Children and the suggested responses to them. Roughly translated, the four children are: the wise one, the wicked one, the simple one and the one who does not know how to ask.

This section has had much attention devoted to it in the
voluminous literature that has developed around the themes of the Haggadah. Especially today, with our concerns for Jewish continuity and the multiplicity of ways that people have adopted as their own expressions of Jewish identity, there has been a lot of discussion around ways of understanding these ‘types.’ One problem has been to fruitfully use these constructs without falling into the trap of stereotyping people.

But even more particularly problematic is the image of the Read More >

By ahsilver|2006-05-04T11:29:52-04:00May 4, 2006|

Shemini

By Joan Lenowitz

The completion and certification of Seven World Trade Center, the building that stands in the place of the tower that was destroyed on 9/11, signals a new era in energy and environmental design. The building achieves preeminence as the first to receive ‘gold’ certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, an industry coalition which grades buildings on such features as energy and water consumption, indoor air quality and use of renewable materials. (New York Times, April 16, 2006)

Scientists, who have studied the effects of the kinds of changes being made in such buildings in the U.S., have concluded that in addition to the potential savings from reduced consumption of energy and raw materials in the construction and operation of the buildings, and the external conservational effects on the environment, there are also categories of expected savings from effects on the humans who occupy those buildings.

They estimate savings Read More >

By ahsilver|2006-05-04T10:01:16-04:00May 4, 2006|

Tzav

Making Your Guilty Conscience Holy

By Hayley Mica Einhorn

In this week’s parashah, Tzav, the Kohanim are commanded to make a burnt offering, a meal offering, a sin offering, a guilt offering, and a sacrifice of well-being to HaShem (God). The Torah tells us that, ‘The guilt offering is like the sin-offering. The same rule applies to both: it shall belong to the priest who makes expiation thereby.’ (VaYikra/Leviticus 7:7) Despite this, the Torah describes the guilt offering in a different way than the sin offering. While the parashah describes the various procedures that are performed by the priest during the sin offering, the Torah initially describes the guilt offering as kodesh kodashim or ‘most holy’ (Vayikra 7:2) and then goes on to elaborate the specific procedure of the priests.

This distinction immediately caused me to wonder, Why does the Torah describe the guilt korban (sacrificial offering) as ‘holier’ than a sin offering? Read More >

By ahsilver|2006-05-04T09:57:26-04:00May 4, 2006|

VaYikra

Saying I’m Sorry
By Michael G. Kohn

Spring has arrived in New York. Alfred Lord Tennyson once wrote: ‘In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.’ And the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote: ‘How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.’ How do we show our love of God? Well, while the Temple stood in Jerusalem, we showed our love through voluntary offerings at the Temple. And in this week’s portion, parashat Vayikra, the Torah enumerates five, the first three of which are the olah, or burnt offering, the minhah, or meal offering, and the zevah-sh’lamim, or peace offering.

Now, Erich Segal once wrote: ‘Love means never having to say you’re sorry.’ However, for those who love God, but have transgressed one of God’s commandments, the Torah commands that they say they’re sorry. The final two offerings enumerated in Vayikra’hatat, or sin offering, and asham, or guilt Read More >

By ahsilver|2006-05-04T09:44:44-04:00May 4, 2006|

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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