To steal the title of Peter Dreier, et al’s seminal book on metropolitan planning: Place matters. Very simply, where we live profoundly influences who we are and how we interact with others.
The book of Bamidbar/Numbers begins, “God spoke to Moses b’midbar/in the desert of Sinai, saying. . .” Given the [...]
The Tanach counts Israelites three separate times in order to send them to war. ((Encyclopedia Judaica, Census.)) First, almost a year after leaving Egypt, Moses counts more than 600,000 Israelite men of fighting age at Mount Sinai by having each of them submit half a shekel. ((The census takes place at Exodus 38:26; Benno Jacob [...]
Late in this week’s Torah portion, B’midbar, we get a fascinating description of how the Israelites prepared the Mishkan, the tabernacle, for travel.
When it was time to break camp, the Torah tells us, Aaron and his sons would take down the screening curtain and cover the Ark with it. They would [...]
One of my favorite lines in the Torah is God’s reminder to the Jewish people that, “the land is mine; you are but sojourners and temporary residents with me.” (Leviticus 25:23)
This line appears within one of the favorite passages of the Jewish social justice set (yours truly included). As the Jewish people prepare [...]
Does slavery exist in America? This was the provocative subtitle of a 2003 report in The New Yorker magazine about the conditions faced by tomato pickers in Immokalee, Florida. According to the article:
Immokalee’s tomato pickers are paid as little as forty cents per bucket. A filled bucket weights thirty-two pounds. To earn fifty dollars a [...]
Parashat Behukkotai begins with a promise and a threat. The promise: if we follow God’s laws and observe God’s commandments, we will get rain in its season, our silos will overflow with abundance, we will know peace, and God will dwell in our midst. The threat: if we don’t obey and observe the commandments, [...]
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18 Iyyar/LaG b’Omer!
The Dinover Rebbe, Rav Tzvi Elimelekh, taught much about this 33rd day of the Omer, this day we celebrate Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. He said that the point of Lag b’Omer is not to do techinot (supplications), to speak from one’s heart. LaG b’Omer is a time to be happy & [...]
In this week’s Torah portion, Emor, we read a series of instructions pertaining to grain-offerings. When the Israelites enter the land, they are instructed to bring the first sheaf of harvest to the priest, to be elevated before Adonai. Then begins a period of counting:
And from the day on which you bring the [...]
More than almost any other parshah in the Torah, Parshat Emor is packed densely with commandments. ((Parshat Emor has 63 of the 613 mitzvot (24 positive and 39 negative). Only Ki Tetze (with 74) has more.))
Coming fast and furious, there are commandments which define the requirements for the ancient priests, commandments which define the purity [...]
Talmud Masechet Tamid 28a: It was taught, Rabbi says, “Which is the right way that a person should choose? Let him love rebuke, since as long as there is reproof in the world, ease of mind comes to the world, good and blessing come to the world, and evil departs from the world.”
Well, who do [...]
Twice in the Torah portion of “Aharei mot” we are told, “You shall not lie with a man as in lying with a woman.” (Lev. 18: 22 and 20: 13). Today this has become perhaps the world’s most contentious Torah teaching, far beyond the Jewish people.
Some have argued it prohibits all male-male [...]
It is always difficult to read parshat Acharei Mot, the section of the Torah most famous for the verse, “Do not lie with a male as one lies with a woman; it is an abhorrence,” (Leviticus 18:22) which has traditionally been understood as a prohibition on male homosexuality. It is even more complicated than [...]
This week’s Torah portion, Acharei Mot-Kedoshim, contains one of the most oft-commented-upon verses in Leviticus: 18:22, the verse which declares lying with a male as one lies with a woman to be to’evah. Who among us isn’t aware what reprehensible and soul-crushing teachings and behavior that line has been used to justify?
As a passionate [...]
“Aaron shall place lots upon the two he-goats: one lot ‘for YKVK’ and one lot ‘for Azazel.’…And the he-goat designated by lot for Azazel shall be stood alive before YKVK, to provide atonement through it, and to send it away to Azazel, into the desert.”
Most commentators translate Azazel as “a tall steep cliff.” How [...]